


The Rising

by SebbyTaylor



Category: X-Men (Movies)
Genre: F/M, First Kiss, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Post - X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), descriptions of violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-05
Updated: 2014-08-05
Packaged: 2018-02-11 21:25:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 47,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2083686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SebbyTaylor/pseuds/SebbyTaylor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Magneto wants Rogue. Rogue wants Logan. Logan wants Magneto. Who will get who?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This is my first X-Men fanfic so I hope you like :)

They say that you heal over time. An injury patches itself up, scars and fades. The pain of a break-up hurts but it fades as you find other things to fill your life with. The grief of losing a close one burns but it fades as you come to terms with it. 

At least, that's what they say.


	2. Chapter 2

"Get down, Rogue!"

I dropped to the floor as something whizzed over my head, exploding in a shower of golden sparks. Jubilee sprinted past, her hands lit up with paffs as the robot charged forwards. She hollered and threw a plasmoid at it. As it slammed into the bot's chest with a resounding boom, there was a war cry and something else flew over me, colliding with the same force into the android as the paff had done. A large gash appeared on its chest, revealing wires and cogs, and it staggered, the lights in its eyes flickering before it fell to the floor with a deafening crash. Stood on top of it was Logan, looking rather pleased with himself.

I stood and brushed dust from my leathers, glancing round to see Peter returning to his normal form, his skin rippling from silver metal to tanned skin. Logan and he seemed to have really taken onboard the whole 'throwing-a-heavy-and-armed-projectile-at-an-attacking-object' thing. Ororo was  _not_  impressed though, her arms folded and lips pursed to a very thin line.

"Good throw, Colossus," grunted Logan, retracting his claws and jumping from the robot's back.

"I thought I told you, Logan, you must work as a team," snapped Ororo, unfolding her arms. "You're not setting a good example for the Junior Team."

He cricked his neck. "Am workin' as a team, 'Ro. Just not how you see it."

I thought her lips couldn't go any thinner but they did and she turned swiftly on her heel, marching towards a burnt-out car which Kitty was ducked behind. Bobby was a few meters away, peering round the corner of a crumbling building; Jubilee was stood by the crumpled automaton; Kurt was crouched on the roof of an overturned truck, his tail flicking slowly from side to side; Hank was putting on his glasses beside a gently spouting fire hydrant; Warren was swooping over the wreckage, his wings stirring up clouds of smoke and dust which tickled my nose. At least the all the chaos was in the Danger Room so there was no worry of the government having a fit at the mess we'd created whilst trying to stop a rampaging android.

Ororo sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. "Right, I'd like to run through the stimulation again but this time we stay in formation." She threw Logan a steely look. "No heroic actions."

He shrugged, glanced at me with a wicked gleam in his eye and jogged over to the control panel by the door of the Danger Room. In that moment, everything slowed; Logan whirled, his face wild; Jubilee screamed, a finger pointed at me; Kurt vanished, sulfur reaching my nose. Suddenly, I was in the air, a gigantic hand wrapped round my waist, much bigger than the fallen android, and the sound of mechanics whirring was the only sound I could hear. I writhed in the robot's grip, pounding my hands furiously at the iron-like grip holding me, and tried not to think of the height it was lifting me up to. Ever since Liberty Island, my relationship with heights had soured. My heart was galloping a giddy beat in my chest and adrenaline poured through my veins, everything in sharp focus.

People rushed about like ants some twenty feet below. Kurt appeared at the android's feet where I had been several seconds before but he was forced to bamf back to his perch on the truck as the bot took a step forward. Jubilee was throwing plasmoids at the legs of the automaton to cripple it until she realised I was a long way up and when the bot fell, it would be a long way down.

"Get in formation!" bellowed Ororo, her eyes swirling white as lightning crackled at her fingertips.

Then, as quickly as it had started, everything vanished, and I mean, literally. The burnt out car and overturned truck faded, along with the spouting water hydrant and the crumbling buildings. And the robot guttered briefly before disappearing. Which left me hovering in the air for a split second until gravity graciously took over and sent me plummeting to the ground.

At that point, I was very grateful of Logan's hours dedicated to training me to land from heights without causing too much damage to myself. Feet hit the ground first, knees bent to absorb the impact, shoulder dropped to ground to continue absorbing the impact and a roll to slow down.

I remained lying face down on the ground and heard the sound of the Danger Room door opening, feet passing over the threshold. Lifting my head, I saw the boy we'd rescued from the Alcatraz labs, his eyes wide as he took us all in.

"What is it, Jimmy?" asked Ororo smoothly, the first to come to her senses.

Jimmy pointed into the corridor and uttered three broken words. "War Room. Noisy."

The stillness that had filled the room as the stimulation faded away dissipated, the Senior and Junior Teams rushing to the doorway, brushing dust from their uniforms and rubbing hidden bruises as they entered the corridor. Only Logan stayed, Jimmy casting him a wary glance before ambling out of sight.

"Nice language, kid," Logan said with a grin, holding a hand out to me.

"What- Oh…" My language could've put a drunken sailor to shame as I had fallen. "Thanks," I said, grasping his hand and letting him pull me to my feet.

"You okay?" His eyes raked over me, assessing for injuries.

I nodded and allowed my Southern accent to come forth. "Ah'm fahn, sugah."

He smiled half-heartedly, rubbing the top of my head like I was no more than six years old when in reality, I'd just turned twenty. But it wasn't his fault. The last year or so had been hard on him and I guess he just needed someone to be there for him. I was quite happy to be that person but it did mean watching rather a lot of hockey.

I followed him out of the room, wincing as my shoulder protested painfully at closing the door behind us. The corridor beyond was characteristic of the basement levels; white tiled floor, metal wall and strip lighting. Walking behind Logan gave me a chance to admire him without him noticing and in those leather pants, his ass-

I scolded myself mentally. I was twenty. His age was unknown. I had brown hair with white streaks. He liked redheads and blondes. I had untouchable skin. He liked to be touchy-feely. And I'd sworn myself from him. It was just  _wrong_. But, I thought to myself, it didn't stop me from admiring him.

"Will the pair of you hurry up, please?" called Ororo's voice from the War Room. She sounded fed up and I couldn't blame her. She was the head of the mansion now, running it with a lack of suitable staff and an abundance of students with powers.

The War Room was a circular room next to the Danger Room, decorated in similar fashion to the corridors with its metal walls and tiled floors. Large screens covered all the walls, some of them relaying live TV footage from various news stations and others computers, some busy and others blank. In the middle of the room was a large circular desk surrounded by high-backed chairs, a hologram projector placed in the centre of it. All the chairs were filled, though Warren was standing since there weren't any backless ones and Ororo stood, clutching a touch screen tablet. Out of respect for the Professor, we'd left his space empty.

"…appears to have picked up a popular feed on certain media sites," Ororo said as Logan leant against the door frame with his arms folded. I hovered uncertainly between the table and him. "It doesn’t seem like something the systems Kitty has set up would flag until halfway through the feed where the computer has noted the words 'mutant', 'kids' and 'experimentation' in the same sentence." She made a flicking motion on the tablet's screen with her finger and a webpage suddenly appeared on the hologram, the three words she'd said highlighted bright red. "The website is well-known for its hatred of mutants but it usually does nothing more than threaten them. However" – she made another flicking motion and more things scrolled across the hologram – "it appears someone has set up a feed which recounts sensitive details of several open cases of mutant GBH and murders and of a group seeming to collect young children and take them to an island for…experimentation." She spat the last word out.

The atmosphere in the room shifted from alert and calm to tense and apprehensive. It was so thick Logan could've cut it with one of his claws. Hank removed a tablet from the desk, stood and began muttering under his breath as he paced. Warren's wings widened as though he were preparing to take off and Peter clenched and unclenched his fist like he was slowly strangling someone to death.

"Vere does zee feed show zat the children are being taken?" asked Kurt, his tail visible waving from side to side.

Ororo frowned, peering at the tablet's screen with such intensity I half expected lightning to shoot from her eyes. "Somewhere on the west coast," she replied slowly. "At least, the person here is describing what I can only guess is the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco."

" _Alcatraz_?" Jubilee blurted out as I opened my mouth to do so. The whole island was flattened by Jean when the Phoenix broke through. Logan's shoulders tighten fractionally out the corner of my eye.

Hank shook his head, halting his anxious pacing. "No, Jubilation," he said. "There is another island approximately ten kilometers beyond the bridge which the feed could be referring to."

"I didn't know there was another island, Beastie."

"It is privately owned and the owners have it kept off the maps except for those which are supplied to Coastguard and to those who sail round there," he explained, adjusting his glasses. "I cannot find who owns it, though."

Kitty pulled a tablet from the desk as well and started tapping madly away at it. Bobby stood and looked at the screen, his head resting on her shoulder and bare cheek pressed to hers. Jealously swirled in the pit of my stomach like ice in a whirlpool at the casualness of his touch yet I knew it was all innocent. He'd had to be so careful round me that being round Kitty must feel like a drug, able to touch skin-to-skin without the fear of having his life sucked from him.

"I can't find anything on the owners, either," said Kitty.

"So…are we going on a mission?" asked Jubilee. With her massive grin, she looked five years old and someone had mentioned Christmas.

Ororo sighed, continuing to look at the tablet like it would reveal the world's secrets to her if she stared at it for long enough. "Yes. There's no sign of anything too dangerous so Logan, Warren and I will go with the Junior Team and we'll see what we can find."


	3. Chapter 3

As much as I like going on missions, they often involve using the X-Jet and I’m not a major fan of it. I blame the Logan in my head for that but I was nowhere near as bad as the real man himself. He was sat opposite me, eyes closed and looking a little pale. Even his wild hair seemed to be drooping at the ends.

"You'd think Wolvie was a tough guy," whispered Jubilee in my ear. She was sat to my left. "But he looks like he's about to piss himself right now."

A low growl rumbled from him. "Stupid things aren't supposed ter stay in the air," he muttered, opening one fierce hazel eye to glare at her

"Since you're part of the Senior Team, aren't you supposed to be flying this with Ororo?" She glanced at me, a mischievous smirk on her face.

"Her and Kitty are doin' fine without me," he growled, closing his eye again.

I elbowed her in the ribs, warning her to stop. Logan had a shorter temper than usual and teasing him whilst he was on the jet wasn't the best plan for staying alive. If she wanted to be skewered by his claws, fine by me, but I'd rather have a living, breathing friend and not have to clean up a bloody mess afterwards.

"Junior Team," called Ororo over the speaker system. "I want you to listen up and listen closely, please."

Peter, sat on my right, straightened since he was the leader of the Junior Team. Bobby, who was next to Logan, glanced at Peter nervously.

"Peter and I have decided it would be best to parachute on to the island," said Ororo as the jet banked slightly. "It's dark and you've all been trained well. I'll remain on the jet so Peter will jump first, followed by Warren, Rogue, Jubilee, Kitty, Bobby and lastly, Logan. Peter will lead you from then on and you must call each other by your code names. When you have retrieved the information needed, I’ll land the jet for you to get on. Is that clear?"

Peter un-strapped himself and stood as Kitty walked into the hold, immediately sitting down next to Bobby and taking his hand in a death grip. They bowed their heads close together and began talking non-stop under their breaths, earning a glare from Peter who cleared his throat noisily. They jumped apart as though someone had electrocuted them. I bit back a retort, Bobby's betrayal still burning strong in my chest despite a year and a half having passed.

"Right," said Peter. "This is a simple scouting mission. We go in, see what we can find and come back out. If we need to return, we will with better planning 'cos we'll know the site better." I'd always found listening to Peter a little strange because he spoke English like a native but with a faint Russian accent along with his younger sister, Illyana, who had recently arrived at the mansion. "Everyone clear on that?"

We then had to put on the parachuting gear which is rather uncomfortable, even when wearing the most comfortable clothes. Leather uniforms and parachuting harnesses do not go together. And it was rather comic watching everyone tighten their leg straps in a confined space. Warren failed miserably at keeping a straight face.

The helmets, with their heads-up display, were a little more comfortable but doubly unflattering. The world turned green as the night-vision kicked in, numbers relating to the altitude appearing in the bottom right corner of the visor and a small map with seven dots, tracking those wearing the helmets, flashed into existence in the top left hand corner. Warren's karma for laughing at us when we were putting on our harness was that Peter forced him to put on a helmet as well.

"Are we all receiving loud and clear?" asked Peter, his helmet visor flashing as he looked round at each of us.

I looked round as well and noted Logan seemed uptight, his shoulders stiff and his hands more fist-like than usual. I could almost see the haunted expression through the visor of his helmet, the events that had taken place nearby plaguing his mind. No one else seemed to notice, though.

"Drop-off point is in one minute," announced Ororo over the speakers.

A low whine sounded and a whoosh of bitterly cold air rushed into the hold, biting at the exposed flesh of my chin and neck. Peter moved to the now open hatch and peered out as he assessed the conditions. The white tips of wind-whipped waves were visible with my night vision, all heading in the same direction. The lights of San Francisco reflected off them and illuminated the newly built Golden Gate Bridge, a flattened Alcatraz in deep shadow. I half expected Logan to say something but he didn't, his face turned away from the view.

"This looks like fun," said Jubilee, coming to stand beside me. "I bet this'll be a million times better than the Danger Room jumps."

"At least in those, it doesn't matter if you get wet," I said, apprehension twisting in my gut.

Peter glanced over his shoulder at me. "Just follow the crosshairs on the helmet and you should land on the beach I picked out."

 _Should_?

Before I had a chance to point out that this didn't sound very comforting, Peter turned and jumped from the jet, his uniform blending him into the darkness of the night. Warren sprinted past and followed him, his wings spread wide as they took the wind and sailed him after Peter. The whiteness of them reflected the light from the hold, ghosts fading into the night.

"Go on, chica," urged Jubilee, giving me a push. "I'll be right after you."

I swallowed, took a deep breath and jumped.

If I'd thought the hold had been cold, it was nothing compared to the iciness of night. It burned at my bare skin like flames as I plummeted, spinning wildly, and the sound of the wind rushing past me drowned out everything else. Training kicked in and I spread my arms and legs as far as they could go in an attempt to slow and control my rapid decent. The numbers on the head-up display zipped past, too quick comfort. It was nothing like being in the Danger Room. That was controlled and if something went wrong you knew you weren't far from the ground.

I managed to control my fall enough that I was able to concentrate on the heads-up display and notice the red crosshairs in the middle of it. Minor adjustments changed it to green and I let a brief thought of _'maybe I won't end up being a flattened pancake tonight_ ' pass through my mind. If the Logan in my head was having a pink fit, I dreaded to imagine what the real guy was going through. With his ten ton skeleton, he was going fall a lot faster and land a lot harder than the rest of us. "Jump team, report in," said Ororo, just audible over the howl of the wind.

"Colossus, safe," answered Peter.

"Warren, bored."

"Rogue, okay."

"Jubilee, awesome!"

"Iceman, been colder."

"Kitty, alive."

Logan just grunted.

As we drew closer to the ground, the vast spread of ocean was broken by a small craggy island, covered in shrubs and trees. A clearing in the middle of the island held a sprawling complex, miniscule guards visible as they marched round and lights a white blob due to the night vision. The beach which the crosshairs were focused one was narrow and no more than ten meters long. My landings in training hadn't exactly been on target…

"Deploy parachute," a soft voice chimed in my ear.

I fumbled for the ripcord and pulled as hard as I could the moment my fingers grasped it. I was abruptly yanked upwards, relief flooding me as my fall was slowed to an acceptable pace and Warren shot past, reporting that all our canopies were fine.

It was almost relaxing, steering the parachute gently down to the beach, the slowness a stark contrast to the mad tumbling fall a few minutes ago which had starkly reminded me of being ripped from the Jet and being rescued by Kurt. I watched with a shudder as Peter neared the beach, slowed and landed almost gracefully, drawing in his canopy and taking off his harness. Warren landed with ease beside him and helped to shove the parachute gear under an overhanging rock before they turned to look up at me. I was close enough to the ground now that I could see the wet indentations the waves left as they moved back and forth over the sand, the each leaf on the trees and bushes and –

"Rogue!" shouted Peter.

_Oh, shit!_

I had been too busy admiring the green tinted world that I failed to notice just how close to the ground I really was and nearly ended up in the salty soup of the sea. Lifting my legs as high as they would go, I skimmed a wave and then skidded, very inelegantly, along the sand on my bottom before stopping several meters later.

"Neat, kid," Logan snorted, breaking his silence.

I ignored his comment, hastily took off my harness and pulled the canopy in, shoving it under the rock Peter was pointing to from where he was stood under the cover of the trees with Warren. I joined them and watched Jubilee overshoot the beach and scarcely manage to prevent herself from ending up in the sea, her boots dipping into the waves. Kitty and Bobby didn't fare much better. They'd jumped at virtually the same time and this resulted in them landing together. Kitty hit the ground first at the start of the beach which was perfect to allow her some room to slow. But Bobby was not as skilled as his girlfriend and landed on top of her. It was then a mass of knotted cords, ropes and limbs.

"The worst parachute landing I have  _ever_  seen," declared Jubilee as she, Peter, Warren and I rushed forward to help untangle them.

This didn't bode well for the rest of the mission...

Logan landed with ease despite his extra ten tons and, once he had taken off his parachute and hidden it, came over to help untangle the lovebirds.

"You two are gonna be a liability on this mission if yeh keep this up," he growled angrily, releasing his claws with a  _sknit_  and slashing at the ropes holding Kitty and Bobby together.

Kitty blushed and mumbled an apology, clambering over Bobby and brushing sand from her suit. It was several minutes later until Bobby was freed.

"The two of you are not pairing together," said Peter, the visor of his helmet flashing menacingly at them once everything was tucked under the rock. "Iceman you're with me, Shadowcat and Wolverine work together, Rogue and Jubilee team up and Warren will act as a lookout. Find ways of infiltrating into the base, make sure you don't get caught and keep us updated with what you find." He looked round at us, as though daring us to reject his plan. None of us did. "Right, let's go."

Logan and Kitty jogged to the end of the beach and disappeared behind a ledge whilst Warren swept up into the cool night air and Peter and Bobby jogged to the other end of the beach, vanishing into the undergrowth.

"It's you and me, chica," said Jubes with a grin.

Why, oh why, did that  _not_ fill me with confidence?


	4. Chapter 4

Jubilee is a lot of fun. She always sees the bight side of any situation and can make me happy from the lowest of moods. But when it comes to covert missions, she is terrible, something verified as we crouched in undergrowth, peering at the complex through the leaves.

"We could just go in there and I could paff the whole place," she whispered, making to move from the bush we were beneath.

I seized hold of her shoulder and yanked her back down. "Peter said we were to get in  _without_  being seen," I hissed. "Paffing the whole place would get us seen."

"But"-

My glare cut her off. "In. Out. No one sees us."

She pouted. "C'mon, Roguey! I'm getting bored."

"The others haven't got in yet so it doesn't mean we have to be the first," I said. "Just watch and wait."

Grumbling, she pulled her shoulder from my grasp and sank back down, her chin in her hands. There was just no keeping her still.

I pulled myself on my stomach along the ground and pushed a branch aside, taking in the complex spread out before me. Two armed men were pacing back and forth, guarding a thick steel door. They would walk twenty or so meters away from it, turn and walk back towards it, crossing paths in front of the door and heading in the opposite direction. If we could get them at the furthest point of their round then getting in would be easy. I explained my plan to Jubilee.

"Finally, chica," she said, standing. "Thought you'd never come up with anything." She grinned. "I'll see you in a mo!" And with that, she sprinted off into the undergrowth.

"Hope yeh not doin' anything stupid, kid," said Logan in my ear.

"So do I," I muttered, carefully making my way round to the side of the complex, being careful to remain covered. "You close to getting in?"

"Dunno. Shadowcat keeps on insistin' we stay hidden."

I smirked, imaging how hard Kitty must be working to keep Logan under control. Serves her right. "I think I've found a way of getting in."

"Yellow rushed off already?"

"This comms link is for mission purposes only, Wolverine," warned Peter. "Keep the banter down."

"Don't get yeh knickers in a twist, Tin Boy."

I ducked behind a tree and peered round it, watching as the man drew closer, hand resting loosely on his holstered gun. He obviously wasn't expecting anything to happen tonight. He neared the tree, paused and looked around, eyes narrowed. Then, to my horror, he unzipped his trousers and proceeded to relieve his bladder.

Wrinkling my nose in disgust, I ignored what he was doing, crept up on him and slammed a knife strike into the side of his neck. He crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut, though only knocked out. Ororo was adamant that we preserve all human and mutant life whenever possible.

"My man's down, Jubilee," I said, kneeling to rummage in his pockets for something which would allow us to get inside.

"Mine too, chica," she replied brightly. I caught sight of her waving from across the clearing. This was why she was an impossible team member on missions.

"Keep out of sight," Peter advised as though he knew exactly what she was doing.

"We will, big guy," said Jubilee, practically bouncing to the door, an access card clutched in her hand. Somehow, I don't think he was inspired by the tone of her voice.

I pulled off my helmet, the glare from the lights causing the night vision to go haywire, and removed the comms unit from it, putting it back in my ear. Jubilee did the same then pushed the card into a slit in the concrete wall by the door. For a few tense moments, the light continued to flash red before turning green and the door slid back with a pneumatic hiss to reveal a long, bleak corridor leading off into shadows. The fluorescent strip lighting did little to illuminate the passageway, some flickering forebodingly and, although my suit was doing a very good job at keeping me warm, it didn't prevent the chill that rippled over my skin.

"C'mon," said Jubilee, taking my hand and dragging me inside. "We won't find anything if we stay here."

There was the sound of a kafuffle through the comms and Peter asked in a strained voice, "Are the pair of you in yet?"

"We are, Colossus," I replied, pulling my hand from Jubilee's grip and pressing myself to the wall.

"Report back with – oh, will you just knock it off already! – report back with what you find." A dull thud resounded through the comms and I felt sorry for whoever was the on receiving end of his punch.

"Will do."

"They sound like they're having fun," said Jubilee, inching along the corridor, her hands shimmering.

The corridor ended in a T-junction, Jubilee deciding to turn left. I peered round the corner to check for guards when I spotted a group of four of them coming from the right and grabbed Jubilee's hand, pressing her hard against the wall with a hand over her mouth. I pressed myself to her just in time. They walked past, boots thudding in time with my racing heart.

"Will you  _look_  where you're going?" I hissed, releasing her and stepping back. "You're going to get us caught if you're not careful."

She pouted. "C'mon, chica," she whined. "I'd seen them."

"Really?" I raised an eyebrow. "Cos you nearly walked straight into them."

"Don't pull that face," she told me. "You look just like Logan when I've done something stupid."

"Good," I snapped, peering round the corner again. "It might make you think."

We turned after the guards and followed them, being mindful to stay in the shadows and they soon led us to a more intricate part of the complex, several floors down. We passed what looked like a control room, a recreation room and something that looked suspiciously like a torture room. Whatever they did at this place, it sure wasn't nice.

"Colossus and Iceman are in at the north entrance," said Peter.

"At least we're not the only ones now," I muttered, grabbing Jubilee and ducking through an archway as a guard looked over his shoulder.

We lost the men a few minutes later upon reaching the end of a corridor which split off into another four.

"I say we go…that-a-way," said Jubilee, pointing to the second from the left passageway.

I cast it a doubtful look, glanced at the other three corridors and shrugged. The whole place was on a low alert and no one seemed to be looking for us so I went after her, though remembering to keep my wits about me. There was no need to let my guard down now.

The corridor wound its way round and round until we came to a solid steel door, a tiny foot by foot foggy plastic window in the centre of it. Jubilee reached out for the handle and tugged it down, pushing it open. Beyond was dim and a strong musty smell seeped from the walls. Barred doors with chains and padlocks round the poles lined the stained walls at regular intervals, some with lights on and others dark.

"Er, guys?" I said into the comms. "I think…Jubilee and I have found a prison block."

A growl filled my ear which Peter swiftly spoke over. "See what you can find but don't get caught."

I suddenly felt very sober as I stared down the narrow passageway before me, the idea of people being held against their will and experimented on chilling me to the core. I'd known we'd find something but I wasn't expecting  _this_.

Jubilee stepped forward and cautiously peeked into one of the cells, grasping the bars and frowning. She moved to the next one, her frown deepening.

"There's no one here," she said, progressing to the next cell. "They're empty, Colossus."

"Whaddya mean they're empty?" growled Logan.

"They're empty as in there's nobody in them," I answered, walking along the opposite side to Jubilee. "I thought loads of kids were being taken here."

"Stay where you are," ordered Peter. "I'll find you and we'll sort out what to do next."

I continued along the passageway, peering into the cells. Each one had a steel bunk, a toilet and a sink bolted to the floor, a shelf on one wall and a hatch in another. They looked ready to hold people yet there was no one in them. Something was very,  _very_  off.

A guttering light at the end of the corridor caught my attention. I turned and found it was coming from the end cell, a fluorescent strip struggling to light. Gesturing to Jubilee, I walked towards it and glimpsed a shadow hunched in the corner.

"Hello?" I called. "Hello? Can you hear me?"

"What's going on, Rogue?" demanded Peter.

"Shh," Jubilee hissed, falling into step behind me. "We've found someone."

"Hello?" I called again.

The shadow lifted its head and my heart twisted as I realised it was a young girl, no more than ten years old. Her grimy, pale cheeks were streaked with dried tear tracks, her blonde hair was matted and her clothes were dirty and torn.

"Mommy?" she croaked, her eyes wide with fear. "Is that you, Mommy?"

"No, honey, it's not," I said gently, nearing the cell and placing my hands on the bars. "But we're here to help you. There's no need to be scared."

"I want my Mommy," she whispered.

"Come here." I held out a hand through the gap, surreptitiously checking to make sure my skin was covered. The girl didn't need to be any more frightened than she already was. "Come here and we'll help you. I promise."

The girl gazed at Jubilee and I for several seconds, her mind working furiously behind her deep blue eyes. Then, tentatively as though she hadn't done so in a while, she stood and stumbled to me, her tiny hand latching onto mine.

"Some other people are coming but they're here to help like us," I told her, Jubilee nodding madly beside me. "I promise we'll get you out of here."

The girl blinked. A wicked smirk curled at her rosy lips. Then, before my eyes, she began to change. She grew taller, her face narrowing and limbs elongating. Her skin crawled like a centipede over leaves, absorbing her clothes and turning into a deep blue. And her eyes changed from blue to bright amber. She grinned at me, showing off her fangs.

"Guess you weren't expecting that, Rogue," she said, tightening her grip on my hand.

Mystique was staring back at me.


	5. Chapter 5

"You!" Jubilee blurted out. "How-I thought"-

Mystique yanked me forwards, slamming me painfully against the bars. "You thought what?" she challenged. "That I was de-powered?" She snorted, twisting my wrist sharply. "Think again."

"What's going on, Rogue?" demanded Logan in my ear.

I ignored him, trying to wheedle my wrist from her grasp without her noticing. "How did you get here?" I asked to distract her.

"Like you," she answered with a grin. "By air."

"I think she means how you ended up getting your powers back and being here?" said Jubilee darkly, lighting up her hands. "Now let go of her, you bitch."

"Or what? You'll paff me?" She rolled her eyes. "Your little sucker friend will get paffed, too."

Jubilee threw her a filthy glare.

 _Hurry up_ ,  _Logan_ , I thought, continuing to try and prize my wrist from Mystique. "What do you want from me?"

She laughed but it cold and cruel. "Why do you think I'm after you?"

I looked pointedly at her grip on my wrist.

"Oh, okay, you got me there. I don't want you personally. I'm just waiting for the back-up to arrive."

I bent my elbow towards her in a move Logan had taught me in an attempt to get free whilst trying to keep my face void of the fear coursing through me. Jubilee whirled to face the corridor as something clanged beyond the door, her hands glowing with plasma.

"Rogue!" Logan growled in my ear. "What the fuck’s goin' on?"

Mystique pulled me harder against the bars and pressed her face close to mine, so close I was scared she would touch my bare skin. "You wanna call your puppy dog to come and rescue you?" she whispered, a malicious glint in her ochre eyes. "I'm sure he'll come running."

At that moment, my hand came free from her grasp and I tumbled back, crashing into Jubilee who screamed and sent a large paff into the corridor as we toppled to the floor. There was a deafening yell and something slammed against metal. I heard Logan snarl and the characteristic  _sknit_  as he extended his claws echoed round the now silent corridor.

I rolled off a protesting Jubilee to see Mystique wielding a key in one hand and my glove in the other, a smug grin gracing her features. I rolled back onto my stomach and saw Logan and Kitty had entered the corridor, Kitty looking horrified and Logan looking utterly furious, his claws brandished before him and glinting in the poor light. I was surprised to see their helmets were gone.

"Ooh, your puppy has arrived," trilled Mystique, the key rattling in the lock as she unlocked the barred cell door. "Hope he can save you."

I scrambled to my feet, my exposed hand feeling like an unstable bomb, and turned to run. Just as Logan roared, something shot out of one of the empty cells, ploughing into me like a bus. I screamed, slamming into the opposite cell and my head hit one of the bars, sending pain shooting through my skull as I crumpled to the floor. Whoever was on top of me weighed a ton. And smelt like a wild animal.

"Get off!" I shouted, keeping my uncovered hand under me. "Get off me!"

A leather gloved hand clamped itself over my mouth, almost choking me as it gripped my chin. Sharp nails had pierced the leather and dug into my cheeks. Yanked suddenly to my feet and spun round, my head whirled, both from the movement and the onslaught of adrenaline. I was to have to ask Logan about this adrenaline thing because being dizzy in the middle of a fight is really not a very good idea.

"You gunna come 'n' get her, runt?"

It was Sabretooth holding me to his barrel chest. Sabretooth, who Scott had blasted through the head with his optic beams. Sabretooth, who had fallen the height of the Statue of Liberty.

Logan growled and I focused on where he was to stop the world spinning. The look he was giving Sabretooth should've killed him on the spot but he was just chuckling, a deep, unerring rumble in my ear.

"What's going-?" I heard Peter start, sprinting through the door with his skin shifting before skidding to a halt, Bobby nearly crashing into him. Neither of them had their helmets on either. He gaped at Sabretooth and me before his wide eyes wandered to Mystique who was shutting the cell door with a quiet ring. "H-how-?"

-"did I get here?" she finished for him. "Same way as you did." She smirked, dropping the keys to the floor with a clatter and twirling my glove in her hand. "You weren't as stealthy as you thought you were."

"We were!" he protested.

She snorted. "I watched Rogue and Jubilee make enough mistakes to cringe at. Peter and Bobby didn't do much better. The only people I didn't see were Logan and Kitty."

I was irked at her use of our real names but it was clear she didn't know mine. Only Logan and the Professor knew that.

"Those guards were men off the streets who wanted money and to carry a gun," Mystique continued, walking towards me, sashaying her hips like she was on the catwalk. "And technology gets better every day. Your jet's invisible shield isn't so invisible any more."

"Whaddya want?" Logan growled, his eyes flicking to mine.  _I'll get you. Trust me_.

Mystique stopped beside Sabretooth and reached out, her slender hand brushing back an escaped strand from my white streak. "I want this one."

"Why?"

"Oh, because someone else wants her and I'm being paid well," she answered, dragging a nail across my cheekbone.

I flinched away from her and discovered just how hard Sabretooth's chest was. My heart was racing again. If it kept on going like this every other hour then it would leap from my chest and leave me behind, gasping for breath. In fact, it didn't even need to leave me to do that. Which was a little worrying.

Everything happened at once; two figures dropped from the ceiling, crashing into Kitty and Peter; Sabretooth spun as Logan lunged with a roar; Jubilee and Bobby fired their powers at Mystique who jumped higher than I thought possible for her. Then I was thrown through the air and something latched on to my upper arm, abruptly halting my flight. Metal rung on metal, concrete exploded somewhere to my left and flesh sounded on flesh. I was too busy, however, to really notice what was really going on. I was a little caught up with trying to not get flattened under Logan and Sabretooth who were sparring at high-speed. I was also trying to avoid being stabbed by Logan's foot long claws and Sabretooth's one and a half-inch nails. A healing factor is useful, though not when it comes from someone else and has their memories attached to it.

"Who are yeh workin' for?" growled Logan, slashing out.

I pressed myself against a wall, breathing in as they twirled past, and caught sight of my glove which Mystique had dropped ducking a paff from Jubilee. Then I realised it wasn't just Mystique and Sabretooth anymore. There was the disgusting Toad battling Jubilee and Kitty and a _huge_  guy I'd never seen before lashing out at Peter and Bobby, nearly knocking them off their feet. And this was all in a corridor no more than two and a half meters wide and twelve meters long. Yes, that sounds like a lot of space. Trust me, it's not, especially in a situation like this. Which meant getting my glove was going to be a lot harder.

Logan and Sabretooth whizzed past once more, parrying and throwing blows, snarling and growling at each other like rabid dogs.

"I said, who are yeh workin' for?" demanded Logan, dropping to the floor and slamming a foot into Sabretooth's knee.

Sabretooth grunted and shifted his weight, using his momentum to charge at him. "I heard ya the first time, runt."

"Then answer me!"

His answer was to throw a punch at Logan's skull then swear profusely. How can you forget the guy has a head like adamantium, literally? Logan just shook his head and I watched the shift in his persona as the animal came through; broader and lower stance, teeth bared to the gums, wisps of gold swirling through his hazel eyes.

Uh oh…

I threw myself into the cell Mystique had been in, eternally grateful she'd left it unlocked. But it was hardly a barrier against the two men. They slammed into it and the bars buckled like they were paper. Grit fell to the floor. Jubilee sent a paff in Toad's direction. It flew past him and I dropped to my stomach, hands over my head, to avoid it. Kitty was parrying Mystique who was getting frustrated at her phasing ability. Bobby and Peter were trying to knock the big guy to the floor. And I was barricaded in a cell, doing nothing. That's what happens when your mutation takes on people's memories, fears and fantasies. Not able to defend myself with super strength, plasma balls, ice, claws or becoming like smoke. Just another person stuck in my head, building up my collection if I used _my_ mutation.

"Rogue!" Peter bellowed. "GET OUT OF THERE!"

Time slowed. Sabretooth got the upper hand in his fight with Logan, grabbed his shoulders and spun them so Logan was pressed to the bars. Then, he drove all his strength at Logan and the bars finally gave way with an almighty crash.

I screamed and rolled, feeling bits of debris pelt me and listening to the clang of the bars hitting the concrete. My comms fell from my ear and I suddenly felt very alone. Logan and Sabretooth shot past, colliding with the back wall. Sabretooth had his hands round Logan's neck, his nails digging in and not seeming to notice the six claws buried to the hilt in his chest, blood oozing round them.

"Strangulation ought ta kill ya, runt," he growled, tightening his grip

Logan's face was slowly turning to the color of puce. There was no way he could overpower Sabretooth who was nearly twice the size of him and had completely given over to the animal.

Animals get distracted by pain they're not expecting, don't they?

So I did the first thing that came to mind. I grabbed a broken bar with the sharpest end and plunged it into Sabretooth's back as hard as I could.

It had the somewhat desired effect I was looking for.

Sabretooth roared and let go of Logan, throwing him aside like a rag doll and turning his attention to me. His eyes were entirely gold as he pounced and smashed into me with the same force he'd used earlier. I was slammed to a wall, back first, and was met with the horrific sight of an incensed Sabretooth. Now his gloved hands were round  _my_  neck and I couldn't breathe, no matter how much I scrabbled at them. Lights popped behind my eyes. Everything was turning fuzzy…

" _Sabretooth_!" shrieked Mystique. "She supposed to stay  _alive_!"

I was dropped to the floor, staring at battered boots backing away as I struggled for breath, clutching my bruised throat. Someone shouted and footsteps retreated down the corridor, a couple sounding a little reluctant to be doing so.

"Marie?" a worried voice whispered and strong hands gripped my shoulders, pulling me upright. "Marie, are yeh okay?"

I nodded, unable to speak since I was still gasping for breath.

"Is everyone alright?" Peter called.

Dismal replies answered him and I looked up to see everyone was stood around me in various states of injury whilst Logan was crouched before me, his eyes back to their usual mesmerizing hazel and concern masking his face. He opened his mouth but decided against it and swooped me up, bridal style, in his arms, not seeming to care that there were rips in his uniform and that my face and one hand were bare.

"Yeh crazy," he muttered in my ear as Peter led us out of the maze-like complex. "Absolutely crazy."


	6. Chapter 6

The flight home was practically silent. We left the complex and Ororo landed the jet on the waves, using the modifications Kitty and Hank had put on, and Warren, who had been flying unaware of what unfolded inside, joined us.

Everyone, apart from Logan and I, was sat in the front of the jet with Ororo, whose hair was looking a little static-y. No one uttered a word.

Logan stared at the seats opposite, his eyes glazed over and hands rhythmically clenching and unclenching in tandem. Dried blood was streaked across his face and ripped uniform and through some of the tears I could see some wounds were still healing, pink and raw but fading.

When the jet landed back at the mansion, Ororo forced us to the War Room, though Logan managed to evade her and sneak off somewhere. The atmosphere was so tense I half expected the room to implode. Everyone was staring resolutely at a spot in the room while Ororo paced. Hank and Kurt joined us, adding confusion to the mix of emotions roiling round the room.

Jubilee had a gash across one cheek which was bleeding gently. Dirt and grime smeared Kitty's face. Bobby had a black eye and a very swollen nose. Peter looked thoroughly disgusted. In short, the Junior Team was a mess.

"What happened?" Ororo finally said in a voice far too calm for the whole situation.

Peter's eyes flickered to me. "I think Rogue should explain."

So I did.

"Are you sure you saw Mystique and Sabretooth?" Hank asked me once Ororo had finished having a go at us for leaving our helmets behind after I completed retelling the tale, peering over his glasses at me.

I nodded, keeping my eyes trained on my hands, one naked and one clothed. "It was definitely them."

"And Mystique said she specifically wanted you?" asked Ororo.

I nodded again. "But she didn't say why or for who."

"It looked like she was leader of the others," said Peter. "She was the one giving orders."

Hank turned pensive. "Why would Mystique want Rogue?" he mused. "She has no reason for her." His eyes widened and something passed between him and Ororo. "Unless it is to"-

-"do with the Brotherhood," Jubilee cut in.

"I was going to say Magneto," said Hank with a shrug. "But if Mystique is working for Magneto, then I presume it will also involve the Brotherhood."

"Didn't Magneto ditch Mystique when she lost her powers?" Bobby said with a frown.

"And she turned to the government once he did that," Kitty pointed out.

"She led us to the wrong place," said Hank with a wry smile.

"She might've had the wrong information."

"I highly doubt that, Kitty, my dear."

Warren cleared his throat, leaning against Kitty's chair with his arms folded. "Can I just say, if Mystique's got her powers back completely, does that mean the jerk has his back, too? And everyone else who got the cure?"

"Most likely," answered Hank, expression weary. "I will have to notify the office."

Ororo pursed her lips. "I know where Magneto is," she said. "Peter, I want you to come with me and talk to him."

"But"- I started. I had every right to go and see him.

Ororo's glare cut me off. "If he wants you, Rogue, you'll be walking straight into a trap."

I scowled. As usual, she had a point and she was right.

She sighed, the tension and authority leaving her in a rush. "It's nearly half past five in the morning," she said. "Go and sort yourselves out and Peter, we'll be leaving here at eight. Get some sleep, please."

I stood to leave the room when a hand settled on my shoulder. I turned to see Ororo, the world on her shoulders.

"Stay in the mansion," she said. "I'm sure this is only a minor hitch."

 -:-:- 

I went to my room, showered and pulled on my comfiest clothes – a pair of baggy sweats, a well-worn granddad top, owl print socks and a pair of white silk gloves – as quickly as I could. I needed to check Logan was okay since he hadn't been at the debriefing nor in the kitchen, though his hidden stash of beer was gone.

Checking my reflection in the mirror, I headed into the corridor and along to his room, knocking gingerly on the door.

"Logan?" I called.

There was no answer so I pushed the door open to find the room in semi-darkness, the weak pre-dawn light bleeding round the closed curtains. My eyes adjusted and spotted Logan sprawled on his bed, still fully dressed in his uniform and boots. Numerous beer bottles stood on the bedside table and several empty ones were scattered on the floor. A half-full bottle was clutched in the hand resting on his stomach and a lit cigar was hanging from his lips. He gave no acknowledgement that I'd entered his room except for a flicker of his eyes towards me as I sat tentatively at the foot of his bed.

The glazed look was still in his eyes along but something haunted had crept into them as well. Tension creased the corners of his eyes and held his shoulders stiff. A well-trained beauty therapist would have a hard time working the knots from his muscles.

"You wanna talk about it?" I said, reaching for the bottle in his hand. He made no attempt to keep hold of it as I took it from his grasp and brought it to my lips. I could taste him as I let the bitter liquid pour into my mouth.

His eyes lost some of the haunted appearance as they focused on me. He grunted, leaning forward to pluck the bottle from my grasp and drinking the rest of it in one mouthful. His eyes closed and for a moment, he looked at peace with himself. But they opened and he looked ten times worse, dropping the bottle casually to the floor and picking another up. He slid out a claw, popped off the cap and downed half of it, the cigar still in his mouth. His lip skills-

I halted that train of thought. This was about Logan, not me, for the time being. "You need to change," I said, taking his free hand resting on his stomach and pulling. "Go and have a shower."

He grunted and yanked his hand from my grip. I ignored the way hurt twisted at my chest and grabbed his hand, hauling with all my weight. Not that it would ever get him up. But he got up, growling half-heartedly, and walked into the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

I let my gaze wander round his room, taking in everything. A faded flannel shirt hung on the back of his desk chair. An empty beer bottle was acting as a paperweight on the desk, his Indian buckled belt next to it. His boots stood by his wardrobe. A hockey match was on the TV, the sound muted. Cigar smoke tickled my nose, faint traces of sandalwood and cinnamon mixed with it. The room was entirely Logan.

I crawled up the bed and buried myself under the covers, rolling over to the warm spot where he'd been lying. Inhaling his scent from the pillows, I stared up at the ceiling, wondering why Logan was so depressed. I knew he wasn't comfortable with the San Francisco area but it didn't explain why he'd rushed off without being debriefed. He was forever telling me I mustn't miss a debriefing.

My mind wandered to Logan in the shower, imagining what he would look like with water rushing through his wild hair clinging wetly to his face, dripping through his stubble and rippling over his toned muscle, his skin dark against the white tiles. The water would trickle down and down…

The bathroom door opened and I was jerked from my reverie. Logan was dressed in nothing more than a pair of faded jeans, slung low on his waist so the lines on his hips were visible and disappearing into the waistband along with the trail of dark hair from his navel. This really wasn't helping my daydreams…

I forced my eyes to his face, though admiring his abs and toned chest before letting my eyes rest on his face. He was looking at me like it was the first time he'd seen me curled up in his bed. His hair was rumpled and a strand had fallen free, the tip touching his forehead. I was all I could do to stay in the bed and not get up to brush it back.

"You feeling better?" I asked to distract myself.

He made a non-committal grunt, pulled a wife-beater from his chest of drawers and dragged it over his head, tucking it into his jeans, before coming to sit beside me, his long legs stretched out and his weight making the mattress dip.

"S'my fault," he growled, reaching across me for a beer.

I grabbed hold of it, halting his movement. "What's your fault?" I pressed.

He pulled the bottle from my hand with a glare, releasing a claw, and popped the cap off. "S'all my fault."

I wrapped my hand round the neck of the bottle. " _What_  is all your fault, Logan?"

"Everything." His turned his gaze to me and his eyes were tortured, unseen memories and thoughts passing through his mind. His grip on the bottle slackened.

I took the bottle from his grasp and placed it on the nightstand. I crawled out of the sheets, made him tuck his legs in and sat cross-legged in front of him, my elbows resting on my knees. If I pushed too hard, he would close off. But if I let him go at his own pace, I could find out what was haunting him so badly.

"Jeannie, the Professor…Scott…tonight." He dragged a hand over his face. "S'all my fault."

There was no use telling him he wasn't to blame, despite the fact he wasn't. "Why is Jean's death your fault?" I asked instead, watching him closely.

"I didn't listen to her when she asked me to kill her the first time," he said hoarsely. "If I had, then Chuck would still be alive and none of this woulda happened tonight cos he woulda seen it all."

"Why is the Professor's death your fault?" He needed to get all this out.

"Cos I didn't go in with him when he went ter see Jeannie at her house." His eyes, which had been flitting anxiously round the room, suddenly landed on me. "If I'd been there then maybe he'd still be alive."

"Scott?"

"I shoulda realised somethin' was wrong."

"And tonight?"

His eyes closed. "I didn't see the trap, didn't smell anythin'." His eyes opened and took in my wounds. "You got hurt."

Even after four years he was determined to keep his promise. I studied the man who had hard exterior during the day and seemed his normal self round everyone when in reality, behind closed doors, he was a broken man, affected by the events that happened. And he wouldn't let anyone help him.

I leaned forward and put my hands on his cheeks. " _None_  of this was your fault, Logan. You hear me?  _None of it_."

"It  _is_ , Marie," he said in an agonized voice. "All of it is."

"The hardest thing is to kill someone you love," I told him. "You loved Jean. Don't deny it, Logan," I said as he opened his mouth to protest. "You did, like you loved the Professor and Scott."

"I"-

"I know; you didn't love them like you loved Jean. You loved them as friends. The Professor took you in when you had nowhere else go and helped you look for your past and Scott…" I tried to think of what Scott was to Logan. "Well, he was Scott," I said with a rueful smile. "And you miss them." He tried to pull away. I wound my fingers into his hair to stop him. “But their deaths were  _not your fault_.”

“If their deaths aren’t my fault, then who’s ter blame?” he whispered.

“Magneto,” I answered, dropping my hands into my lap. “He manipulated Jean, got the Professor in the way. Scott was killed by Jean.”

His eyes slid close. “But, if”-

“Logan!” I snapped and he jerked as though I’d slapped him. “I’m trying to help you here, make you realize that none of this is your fault and you keep pinning the blame back on yourself. Is that what you want?” I demanded. “For the school to blame you for their deaths? Because none of them do.” I softened my tone. “I don’t Logan. I never have.”

There was a long pause and I could see the cogs turning in his mind, trying to work out whether what I was saying was true or not. I hoped he could smell it in my scent. “Why did you come in here?” he asked, his eyes hidden in the shadows.

“Because I knew you’d be moping,” I answered.

“I don’t mope.”

“Then what are you doing now?”

He grunted and took one of my hands. I marveled at the size difference, his massive palms dwarfing mine, the tanned russet skin so dark compared to the whiteness of my glove. He looked at me, his eyes searching mine. “Why don’t you run like the rest of ‘em, Marie?” he asked quietly.

I glanced down at our hands.  _Because I love you_. “Because I know you.”

He used my hand to pull me to him and within moments we were sprawled on his bed, my head resting on his chest and one of his arms holding me tightly to him. It was so casual and easy, not a care about my skin, I nearly cried. Why couldn’t anyone else be like this? Why couldn’t they have the ease that Logan had round me? Why was it with the only person I couldn’t have? 


	7. Chapter 7

When I awoke, feeling very warm and cozy, I couldn't work out where I was. A slow steady thud filled my ear which was pressed against something hard and soft at the same time, rising and falling gently under me, and an arm was wrapped round my waist. I blinked and squinted, bright sunlight pouring in through the window, suggesting it was at least midday.

Then it hit me. I'd fallen asleep in Logan's room.

He'd pulled me further up his chest whilst we slept and his face was in my hair, his breath tickling me as he muttered incoherent words. One of my legs was twined round his.

"Logan," I whispered, moving my leg and sitting.

A low growl filled my ears and his arm tightened round my waist, pulling me back down. "M'rie," he rumbled, nuzzling the top of my head.

I froze. Logan was dreaming  _about me_? Since when did he dream about  _me_?

"M'rie," he rumbled again before suddenly tensing.

I sat up hurriedly, his arm falling away, and I acted as though I'd just woken, stretching. "Morning, sugar," I said, stifling a yawn.

Logan stared at me for several seconds, his eyes taking in my definitely bird-nested hair and wife-beater crinkled face like he was seeing me for the first time. He blinked and shook his head, the strange look vanishing from his eyes.

"Mornin', kid," he grunted, sitting up as well and raking his hands through his hair so it was even more unruly than usual

"Actually," I said, glancing at his bedside clock, "ah think it's afternoon."

He raised a sardonic eyebrow. "Does it really matter?"

"No." I turned and stood, stretching once more. "Just goes to show that a hard fight can give a good night's sleep."

"Wasn't nighttime."

I glared at him. "Ya get the idea."

"Not sure I do." He stood and walked into the bathroom without a backward glance.

I slumped on to the bed, staring at the closed door, amazed that I'd fallen asleep in Logan's room, yet alone that he'd even let me. What I'd said must've affected him enough to crack his usual hard demeanor temporarily, his guard let down and vulnerability peeking through. I knew he hated appearing vulnerable to anyone. For him to trust me so deeply to be able to do that was a bit of a shock to the system.

The bathroom door opened and Logan appeared, ruffling his hair. Was a guy allowed to look that sexy so soon after waking? I bet I looked like I'd been dragged through a hedge backwards.

"D'ya think Ororo will be back?" I asked, hating the way my voice sounded. It was always worst first thing.

He shrugged, cocking his head slightly. "Sounds like she's rantin' in the kitchen."

"She doesn't rant."

He smirked and folded his arms. "Well, unless you got ‘nother word for what she's doin', she's rantin'."

I narrowed my eyes and stood, stretching again. My top rode up and I caught sight of Logan's eyes flicking down to the exposed flesh. I quickly dropped my arms. He had probably never seen so much toxic flesh exposed. More than a few awkward seconds passed until he cleared his throat and gestured to the door.

"You wanna go and see what 'Ro's goin' on about?" he said.

I gladly took the invitation and left the room, Logan following along behind. The walk down to the kitchen was silent but it was soon filled with the sound of Ororo's raised voice. She was undeniably ranting.

"…then he says he won't talk to us unless the Professor's there!" she fumed as I entered the kitchen. She was leaning on the counter, facing Hank and Peter who were sat at the table. "Oh. Hello, Rogue. Logan."

Logan grunted and headed straight to the fridge, opening it and taking out some orange juice. He downed it without a glass. Ororo wrinkled her nose at him.

"What did Magneto say?" I asked to draw her attention away from him

She pursed her lips. "He just kept saying he wanted to talk to the Professor," she replied.

"Did he say anything else?"

"He didn't deny knowing what happened but he didn't say he was a part of it." She pinched the bridge of her nose. "With Magneto, it could be either way."

"I suspect he is a part of it but not a part of it," said Hank.

"English, Doc," grunted Logan, tossing the empty orange carton in the bin.

"Magneto is most likely acting from the sidelines and ordering others to perform his bidding so he does not get his hands dirty." Hank removed his glasses and began cleaning them with a napkin from the table. "As to what he is ordering them to do, I have no theories."

"We don't need theories, Hank," said Ororo. "Ideas would be useful."

He returned his glasses to his nose. "I suspect Magneto wants to use Rogue to achieve a similar plan as to the one we foiled on the Statue of Liberty. Whether it is to turn humans into mutants or something equally dastardly, I do not know."

Logan snarled, making Peter and Ororo jump. "He knows how her mutation works," he growled. He turned his burning gaze to me. "If he comes near you again, Rogue, kill him, mutation or no mutation."

"So what do we do?" I asked Ororo, keeping my gaze trained on Logan who was watching me closely.

"Truth be told, I don't know," she said. "We have no idea what he's planning or what he's going to do next."

"Miss Munroe! Miss Munroe!" a voice yelled. Rahne, a young student who had arrived during the summer holidays, skidded to a stop in the doorway, her cheeks flushed. "You gotta see what's on TV!"

Ororo cast us nervous glances and reached for the flat screen TV hung in the corner of the room, pressing the on switch. The screen flickered, a news report blaring out of the speakers, and a well-dressed presenter appeared.

"…have just received breaking news that the mutant cure, created by Worthington Labs, has failed," he practically shouted into the microphone clutched in his hand. "I repeat; we have just received breaking news that the Worthington Labs' mutant cure has failed. Numerous cases of mutants checking into hospitals have been reported, showing symptoms that their mutations are reappearing. Warren Worthington II has not issued a statement but it is believed he will be calling a press conference sometime within the next twenty-four hours to"-

Ororo switched the TV off, uttering a stream of words I never thought she would ever say. Even Logan looked surprised.

"Brilliant," she said in a resigned tone, closing her eyes and kneading her temples. "This is what we need right now."

"I need to leave for the office," said Hank, standing. "They will be overloaded very soon." He left the room followed by Rahne. I hoped her ears weren't too damaged by Ororo's language.

"Right," said Ororo. "I need to address the school about this. Peter, I want you to tell everyone you see to pass it around to meet on the basketball court at three o'clock this afternoon." She ran a hand through her hair as he nodded and exited the kitchen. "Rogue, this may seem an impossible task, but we're going to have to see if we can start controlling your mutation."

I started. " _What_?" I gasped. "Are you  _serious_? I can't control it."

"It's either that or Magneto captures you and forces you to do whatever he wants."

 -:-:-

 That was how Logan, Ororo, Hank and I ended up in the Professor's study at half past five that day.

"Charles had been discussing how to control your mutation with Jean, Hank and myself," said Ororo, sat behind the desk. It wasn't really the Professor's study anymore. It was hers but everyone stilled called it the Professor's study. "When news of the cure first came out, we knew you would seriously consider the cure. We didn't mind you getting the cure but we knew you would be more comfortable gaining control of it and still having it as a backup, not completely neutralizing it."

My mind was suddenly flooded with images of Alcatraz, stepping off the bus and looking at the daunting building surrounded by armed guards, my heart and mind warring with each other as I walked towards the open doors. It wasn't until I was sitting in line, waiting for my name to be called out, that I decided against it. My mutation was a part of me and defined who I was. If I couldn't accept that then I was rejecting myself.

"So, what did you come up with?" I asked, perching on the edge of a leather armchair.

"Well," said Hank, clearing his throat. He was sat on a deep red Chesterfield sofa. "The Professor theorized, because of the time your mutation revealed itself, it is most likely defensive. He believed, since you were unsure of what to expect from your kiss, your skin turned on to protect you if he tried to hurt you."

"That doesn't explain why it's always on, though," I told him.

"I believe you became scared of people touching your skin in fear that what happened during your kiss would happen to them and it developed into an instinctive reflex."

"Makes sense," grunted Logan from where he was leaning against a bookcase, his arms folded.

Hope began to bubble in the back of my mind. "So how do we stop it from being an instinctive reflex?" I asked.

"Much like when one keeps hold of a hot plate," he answered. "You overcome the reflex to drop it to prevent sending your dinner to the floor. You will have to overcome the reflex which initiates your mutation."

"How?"

"By brushing aside your fear of it."

I swallowed nervously. The fear was so deeply ingrained I didn't know if I  _could_  brush it aside. But if it meant I might one day control my skin, I was happy to try anything, dancing in a fairy ring under a full moon with a rabbit's leg round my neck included.

"Logan's willing to let you practice on him once you've learnt some meditation techniques that I'll teach you," said Ororo. "You'll have to work hard but I'm sure the end results will be worth it."

Oh, it'd be worth it if I could touch someone without fearing I would drain their life force and memories. My eyes flickered to Logan, imaging the feel of his skin under my bare hands, warm and nothing between us… I shook myself mentally and felt my cheeks burn. I seriously couldn't think like  _that_  with Logan around.

"When do I start?" I asked, trying not to let my hopes get too high.

"We can start now, if you want," she said, standing and ushering Logan and Hank from the room.

"Good luck, kid," Logan said, his eyes slicing through me as Ororo closed the door.

"Right." Ororo ushered me to the middle of the room. "Help me move the coffee table then take off your scarf, gloves and shoes and lie on the floor for me."

The coffee table, despite looking very delicate and spindly, was quite heavy but we managed to set it aside. Feeling rather exposed as I took off my gloves and scarf, I lay down on the Persian rug, gazing up at the ceiling and hoping Ororo wouldn't come too close. She sat on the Chesterfield sofa, resting one knee over the other and clasping her hands together.

"Now, close your eyes." She must've seen me tense because she hurriedly said, "I'm not going to move from here."

I took a deep breath and closed my eyes, wondering what she had planned.

"Put one hand on your stomach and the other on your chest."

I did so, confusion bubbling at the back of my mind.

"When you breathe in through your nose, you should make sure only your stomach rises and when you exhale through your mouth, make sure only your stomach drops. Do this as slowly as possible and focus only on this."

I'm not sure how long I lay there and being bored out of my mind, with no sound except for my measured breathing and the occasional creak of leather and concentrating on nothing but the rise and fall of my stomach, that by the time Ororo cleared her throat, I'd completely forgotten she was there and jumped in surprise. Blinking several times in confusion, I sat up and kneaded my eyes.

"I want you to do this at least three times a day for twenty minutes or so," she said, handing me my gloves and scarf.

I gratefully pulled my gloves on. It seemed too simple to help me. "How is this going to help control my skin?"

"It'll make you focus on something else as well as relax you," she answered. "You need to be as relaxed as possible of we want to start overcoming your fear."

Hope I couldn't tamp down began to creep into my mind. Maybe, just maybe, in some distant reality, I would have Logan…


	8. Chapter 8

Breathe in through my nose…

 _Bang_!

Breathe out through my mouth…

 _Bang_!

Breathe in through-

 _CRASH_!

My eyes flew open and within moments I was storming from my room and into Jubilee's, tugging on my gloves. She had her wardrobe wide open and a pair of hideous block wedges in her hand. There were two large piles of shoes behind her.

"What the  _hell_  are you doing?" I demanded.

"Do you think I should keep these?" she asked, turning to face me, the shoes held out.

"No," I snapped.

She shrugged, threw them on to one of the piles with a resounding  _thud_  and pulled another pair of shoes from the depths of her wardrobe. How many pairs did the girl have?

"Could you do that a little more quietly?"

She studied the platform Mary Janes in her hand and wrinkled her nose, throwing them into the opposite pile of the block wedges. "Why? What are you doing?"

 _Learning to control my mutation_. "Trying to find some peace and quiet." It had been several days since the first session with Ororo and I tried to get in at least five a day. This was my sixth for the day.

"I'm nearly finished, chica."

I peered into the wardrobe. "No, you're not," I said, eyeing the shoes covering the bottom of the wardrobe. "Either you do it quietly or I'll make sure you stop."

She frowned at me. "Who put the bug up your ass?"

I was saved from having to answer that question with a very rude comment by a shrill cry of 'OH MY,  _GOD_!" from downstairs.

Now, in a mansion full of mutant kids with nearly every power under the sun, that could mean anything; Samuel Guthrie had cannon-balled through yet another window; Arama Aquilla had gotten a little too competitive and shot magma over the games consoles by accident; Kurt had bamfed into someone again. However, there was a deafening uproar that followed and somehow, I didn't think it was any of the above.

I glanced at Jubilee and we raced downstairs, nearly crashing into Logan who was on the main staircase.

"Watch it," he growled after us as we rushed into the central living room.

It was crowded since it was the weekend and most of the kids were busy chilling out. But rather than sitting in corners gossiping, playing foosball, reading or playing games, everyone was staring at the TV. A pin drop could've been heard if the speakers weren't at full volume.

"…numerous rallies have erupted throughout the city, New Yorkers protesting at the failure of the mutant cure," said the newsreader. "Many places, which were pick-up points for those wanting the cure, have suffered severe damage due to these disputes, protesters throwing petrol bombs and other improvised missiles at the buildings. Sally, what's the latest from the rally you're at?"

The screen changed to reveal a blonde haired reporter being jostled by an angry crowd.

"Well, Mike, this rally started an hour ago but it already has a few thousand strong," she said, glancing over her shoulder as a particularly loud group passed by, waving obscene banners and shouting abuse. "It was triggered when fifteen year old Sarah Rushman was found in the street, crippled by excruciating pain as her mutation of bone growths protruding through her skin returned. People began to gather around as her mother arrived and started the protest." Someone pushed her and she stumbled. Once she regained her balance, she said, "I'll hand over to Julian who has more details."

The image flickered once more and an Asian man filled the screen, standing to the side of a roiling crowd. "Thank you, Sally. Yes, it does appear the protests are mixed with people from all sides," he said. "I'm on the other side of that rally in downtown Manhattan and recently spoke to a man who views the cure as a way of controlling mutants and that its failure was not Worthington Labs' fault but mutants' because they had found a drug against the cure. An elderly woman I spoke to earlier thinks mutants should have a right to be normal human beings and the failure of the cure is denying them that right. And I have just seen a banner which read, 'Taking the cure was turning your back on your brotherhood"-

"Magneto," I breathed.

"Crap," muttered Jubilee.

"I agree," grunted Logan, pushing past. He snatched the remote from Bobby who was sat on a sofa with Kitty on his lap and pointed it at the TV, the screen going black, much to the annoyance of many.

"We were watching that!" someone shouted.

"What you do that for, Professor Logan?" someone else yelled.

"Quiet!" he bellowed. The chatter immediately stopped and a pressing silence ensued. "Remember what Professor Munroe said the other day; we're all safe here and as long as we work together, nothin' will happen to us." He sounded so sure of what he said, I almost believed him. But I knew something would happen. "Now scat."

It was as though someone had given stage directions. Everyone left the room, apart from Logan, Jubilee disappearing back upstairs to finish organizing her shoe collection.

"How's yeh meditation comin' along?" he asked, walking over.

"Okay," I replied. "Jubes isn't helping though." I scowled. "She's going through her shoe collection."

He snorted. "Well, you're not gonna have to worry cos Ororo wants to see us in the study."

I followed him up the study where Hank, Ororo, Kurt, Warren and Peter were sat around, waiting for us. Logan closed the door and leant against his customary place by the bookcase, his arms folded.

"There's been a severe case of a mutant GHB in downtown Manhattan," said Ororo, kneading her temples. "Her name"-

"Is Sarah Rushman and she's fifteen," I finished. "They mentioned her on the news," I added to their confused looks. "What happened to her?"

"We're not sure," said Peter, sat on one of the armchairs. "It appears her mother wasn't there to give her moral support when she arrived to her daughter's side. The police report here" – he slid a file across the coffee table –"states Mrs Rushman began shouting abuse at Sarah. People heard this on the streets and those who are against mutants joined in and beat her to unconsciousness."

I walked over and picked up the file, flicking through it and stopping at the passport sized photograph. Bright blue eyes gazed solemnly out of the picture, framed by a shock of hot pink hair and a ridge of bone followed her brow line, halfway down her nose and round the edge of her eyes and along her cheekbones. "Are we collecting her from the hospital?" I asked, handing the file back to Peter.

"I have organized a transfer from the hospital to here," replied Hank. He was sat in his favorite place on the Chesterfield sofa. "However, they have requested for protection because more than a few rallies have commenced around it."

"Logan and I will go," said Ororo. "Rogue, I want you to sort out a room for Sarah and find some clothes for her as well, please."

"'Ro," started Logan, moving towards her "I"-

"We spoke about this, Logan," she said in a warning tone, glancing at me. "Nothing can get here."

He grabbed her arm and hissed at her under his breath. She glared at him, her eyes continuously flickering to me and Hank shook his head. Warren groaned.

"Alright," snapped Ororo, stepping away from him. "Fine. Rogue, you're coming with us."

Logan looked rather pleased with himself as he grinned at me.

 -:-:-

 It was a nightmare trying to get into the hospital. The crowds were so dense it was impossible to walk directly to the doors. One guy tried to grope me, another grabbed hold of my scarf, demanding to know if I was a mutant and another shoved a banner into my hands. Logan growled at them all, sending them away. Ororo had made a good call on not wearing the uniform.

"She's on the Langley Ward, room 143," said the receptionist, gesturing down the stark hallway.

Ororo thanked her and we walked at high-speed towards the ward, my scarf fluttering behind me, Logan being completely soundless and Ororo's high heeled boots clacking away. As we grew closer to the ward, I noticed Logan's nostrils flare and the corners of his eyes tighten. I think I was the only one who could see these minute changes. Abruptly, he stopped walking like he'd collided with a brick wall.

"What's wrong?" I whispered as Ororo reached the doorway.

"Can't…move," he managed.

"Magneto…"

"You know," called a voice that grated my nerves. "It's not a very good idea to bring someone who's skeleton calls like a classical orchestra and can be controlled like a puppet when you know I'm involved, Miss Munroe."

The faint smell of ozone filled the air as I ran to the doorway. "What do you want, Magneto?" Ororo demanded, the wind picking up in the room and ruffling our hair.

The room was a private room, a single bed by the window with Sarah lying on it, wrapped in bandages and hooked up to various tubes and wires. Boney growths were developing randomly all over her. Magneto was stood beside the bed and Ororo started when she saw him.

"I want the girl," Magneto said slowly, his eyes making their way to me, stood next to Ororo. "If you give me the girl, I'll let the animal go and no one will get hurt."

"Why do you want Rogue?"

He tapped the side of his nose with a quiet chuckle. "That is for me to know alone."

There was a strangled snarl from the hallway followed by several screams.

"Do you want me to power another stupid machine?" I asked. "Because I'm not doing it."

"Oh, you won't have much choice in the matter, my dear."

Logan snarled again.

An unused IV stand twitched in the corner of my eye and I just managed to yank Ororo down in time as it shot over our heads. It shattered the window, glass falling everywhere and there were more screams.

Ororo rapidly got her feet, her eyes flashing between milky white and dark brown as she struggled to keep her powers under control.

"Why are you here?" I asked.

"It's not only you I want," he answered. "I'm collecting at the moment."

At that moment, Sarah stirred, woken by our raised voices. I heard her whimper and the first thing she saw was Magneto bearing down at her.

"Hello, child," he said in a very grandfather-ly voice. "Do you know who I am?"

She frowned then her blue eyes went wide with shock. "Y-you're…" she croaked.

"Leave her alone, Magneto," warned Ororo.

"I'm here to help you, Sarah," he said ignoring her. "I want you to join me and the Brotherhood because you cannot deny your mutation."

"No, Sarah," said Ororo, rushing forward. "You do _not_ want to join the Brotherhood."

"So you don't believe mutants should have rights as well?" challenged Magneto.

"I do but the way you're trying to get them is wrong."

"Humans understand only violence, Miss Munroe," he retorted. "You must fight violence with violence, I regret to say."

"Violence is never the answer." Her eyes turned cloudy and the smell of ozone became so strong, it burned my nose. "But because of people like you, we have to."

And all hell broke loose.


	9. Chapter 9

A deafening bellow sounded from the hallway followed by a  _sknit_ ; a gale force wind whipped through the room, picking up shards of glass which sliced at exposed skin; something collided into the back of me and sent me skidding to Magneto's feet.

"Come along, my dear," he called over the roar of the wind to me. He raised a hand and began to lift the hospital bed Sarah was in. "No one gets hurt if you come with me."

"No!" I shouted as someone seized my ankle and hauled me backwards, my top riding up.

I rolled to kick whoever it was and discovered it was an incensed Logan, his claws out and a snarl on his face. He charged at Magneto but he halted him in midair with a chuckle. Something slimy wrapped round my wrist, dragging me across the floor again. I yelped and kicked out, catching sight of Ororo busy battling Mystique. My foot hit nothing. Glass dug into my skin and over the howl of Ororo's wind, I could hear Sarah screaming.

A bed frame or something slid past and I latched onto it, my shoulders protesting as whatever was round my waist continued to pull. I rolled and was repulsed. It was Toad, grinning at me. Now I could see what was holding me, I swung a leg up and drove the heel of my boot into his tongue. He squawked and the tongue unwound, allowing me to scrabble to my feet and charge at him while he massaged where I'd kicked him. I landed a perfect roundhouse kick to his jaw and he staggered back through the doorway, much to the horror of various hospital staff who had remained in the corridor. They rapidly fled as Toad straightened up and fixed his eyes on me. I dropped my weight into a defensive stance as Logan had taught me, watching Toad closely.

"What are you doing here?" I demanded over the howl of the wind. At least there was no glass shredding my skin to pieces any more.

He grinned and I barely registered the flick of his tongue in time to duck. It whipped past me, just missing me before it swerved and seized hold of my wrist, yanking me forwards. I stumbled as I fought to stay upright. He lifted me off my feet and threw me through the air at high speed. Ducking my head to protect it, I slammed into the opposite wall and sent several nurses running, screaming at the top of their lungs. I dropped to the floor like a stone and something in my arm snapped, pain searing through me. But I had no time to see how bad it was. Toad was busy making his way towards me, malice in his eyes.

Holding my throbbing arm to my chest, I scrabbled into a crouch and drove an upwards kick into his throat. He staggered back, clutching his throat as he gasped for breath. I rose to my feet and swung a knife strike into his neck, causing him to stumble and fall to the floor, stunned. Ororo would be proud; two strikes and the opponent was down, alive albeit a little dazed. And I'd done it with a possibly broken arm.

Adrenaline numbed the pain to a buzz and pounded in my ears so loudly I could hardly hear the maelstrom in the room but it became almost deafening as I ran into it. Magneto was holding a snarling Logan in the air whilst attempting to manipulate Sarah's bed out of the room and Ororo was hurling lightning bolts at Mystique who was busy dodging them. Shards of glass whirled round the room, colliding with anything and everything and Sarah was sobbing, clutching her sheets as the bed steadily made its way towards the door, still attached to various machines and drips.

I sprinted towards Magneto, knowing he would have to either have to drop Logan or stop moving Sarah to stop me. Ororo shouted something but the drumming my ears was too loud. Suddenly, I was spinning through the air and smashed into another wall, my wounded arm taking the brunt of the collision as I dropped to the floor. I screamed, pain turning my vision hazy, and rolled away from the wall only to find myself in the grasp of the blue-skinned Mystique, her hand winding its way into my hair. She hauled me to my feet and yanked my head back.

"Let go of her, Mystique!" shouted Ororo, her eyes swirling white, hair moving with a mind of its own and lightning jumping over her skin.

"Or what?" Mystique sneered. "You'll zap us with one of your bolts?" She sniggered as Logan, who was still hovering in the air, growled. "I don't know how well Rogue will cope with one billion volts coursing through her."

"Take her out of here," barked Magneto.

Mystique dragged me back towards the door, keeping my head twisted back and a warning hand on my shoulder. Ororo lunged for us but Magneto managed to throw something her way and it collided with her temple, sending her crumpling to the floor as we left the room.

"Where are you taking me?" I demanded, shifting my shoulder to see how tight her grip was on me.

"Oh, shut up." She switched her hold to my pulsating arm. "Move it."

I drove my good elbow into her stomach. Her grip slackened momentarily and I moved to bolt back into the room. But she grabbed my bad arm, dragging me back and the searing pain almost blinded me.

"You can't get away that easily," she breathed into my ear, twisting my arm sharply behind my back.

Lights danced behind my eyes. "What do you want me for?"

Her answer was to twist my arm harder and I nearly fainted from the pain burning through my veins. I didn't notice her shove me back into the room.

"Let go of her." Ororo had her hands either side of Magneto's helmet.

Logan snarled, his eyes flaming gold as they landed on me.

"Or what?" Mystique challenged again.

"I'll kill him," she answered.

"Isn't that what you want?"

"It won't fix anything."

Suddenly, Sarah's bed shot past me and flew through the window, an IV stand whipping Ororo round the head. She crumpled to the floor once more, blood oozing from her temple.

"Leave her!" Magneto barked to Mystique. "We have one girl." His eyes flickered to me. "We'll retrieve  _her_  later."

Mystique shoved me away but not before she gave my arm one last twist. The pain engulfed everything and swallowed me into a black chasm, pulling me down and down…

 -:-:-

 I ached everywhere, a bone-deep ache that radiated into every cell and pore. Bright lights assaulted my eyes and I squeezed them tighter with a groan. My arm throbbed the worst. Blinking, I slowly opened my eyes and saw I was in the med bay, the lights glinting off the stark walls. An IV line was hooked up to one arm and the other was incased in solid plaster. So it was broken…

"Marie?"

I rolled to find Logan sitting in a very uncomfortable looking chair, his elbows on his knees and still dressed in his uniform. His hair looked as though he'd been raking his hands through it regularly out of worry.

He stood and walked cautiously towards the bed. "You okay?" he asked in a quiet voice, brushing a strand of hair from my face with a gloved hand.

I nodded then stretched, feeling more aches and pains flare up and wincing. "How long have ah been out?"

"All night," he answered, trailing his finger down my cheek. "Hank drugged yeh up." He wrinkled his nose.

"So now I smell funny," I said with a small smile. "How bad is the break?"

"Snapped both bones yeh forearm clean in half. Hank had to reset one of 'em."

I groaned. No wonder it had hurt. "Is Ororo okay?"

"She's got two stitches."

"And you?"

He shrugged, shame and annoyance passing across his face. "Magneto stretched a couple of bones but I'm fine."

I pursed my lips. "You're not impressed, are you?"

He said nothing, just scowled and continued trailing his finger across my cheek.

"It's not your fault," I said. "Yeah, you're a liability around Magneto but we didn't know he was going to be there."

He opened his mouth to say something, only to close it and step back as Ororo walked in, concern a mask on her face. It fled upon seeing I was awake.

"Are you okay, Rogue?" she asked, peering at me.

"I'm fine," I replied, pushing myself into a sitting position, ignoring my aching arm.

"Unfortunately, you're not going to be able to train for at least two months. However, it does mean, during the times when you would usually be training, you can practice touching people."

I glanced at Logan. There's no rest for the wicked.


	10. Chapter 10

Trying to find a glove that fitted over the cast was a nightmare. It was hard enough trying to get gloves to match what I wore normally but the only thing that would fit was a garden glove which looked atrocious. So, several days later, I resorted to wearing a sock over my hand, much to the amusement of many.

"Yeh feet are down there, kid," said Logan when he saw me.

I glared at him and grabbed a bowl from the cupboard to make myself some cereal. "Unless you want me 'accidentally' touch you, Logan, keep your mouth shut."

"Your skin doesn't bother me so the threat doesn't work."

I felt my cheeks warm, as they did whenever he mentioned that he didn't see my skin as toxic. I hurriedly turned away from him and busied myself with making breakfast.

"Rogue?" called Ororo as she walked into the kitchen. "Can you meet me in the study once you've finished your breakfast? You should come, too, Logan."

I surreptitiously glanced at Logan over the edge of my bowl. He was getting bacon out of the fridge, unfazed by the prospect of touching my skin. I, however, had a racing heart and was a little light-headed at the thought.

"What are we doing today?" I asked, taking a mouthful of my cereal.

"Something along the lines of hypnosis," she answered.

Logan snorted. "I don't think makin' Rogue dance round the room like a chicken will help, 'Ro."

"There's more to hypnosis than that, Logan." She cast him a scathing look as she left the room.

"If looks could kill," I said, "that one certainly would've."

 -:-:-

 Twenty minutes later, after Logan had eaten three helpings of a full English breakfast and downed a liter carton of orange juice, we were in the Professor's office. Logan was sprawled on the Chesterfield sofa, Ororo was perched on the edge of a leather armchair and I was lying spread-eagled on the rug, gazing up at the ceiling with my glove, sock and scarf off and feeling a little naked. I'd already spent time performing the breathing exercises, wondering what Ororo had planned.

"Right," she said. "I want you to close your eyes and imagine someone touching your skin."

I swallowed, fear spiking in my chest despite the fact I knew nothing dangerous was going to happen, and closed my eyes, breathing slowly and deliberately as Ororo had taught me. I imagined Logan getting off the sofa, sitting beside me and taking my unwounded hand in his, the feel of his skin against mine. Would I be able to feel his pulse, racing like mine did when I looked at him? Would his hands be smooth or rough to the touch? Would he be happy that I could touch?

His hand trailed up my arm, skimming the sensitive crease of my elbow, up past my shoulder, along my collarbone and down, coming to a stop over my heart. Then he leant forward, nearing closer and closer, the smell of sandalwood and cinnamon and cigar smoke overwhelming and his hazel eyes closing and…

"Rogue?"

My eyes flew open to find Ororo still on the edge of the armchair but Logan was sat next to me on the floor, his hand hovering an inch or so above mine. I shrank back, colliding with the coffee table.

"And that's what we have to overcome," said Ororo. "If anyone is too close, you immediately leap away. If we can stop that and desensitize the fear then we'll be on the right track."

I scowled at her as I shuffled back into the middle of the rug. "Next time, y'all tell meh if someone's gonna be near meh or y'all regret it." I inwardly cringed at my voice, the fear bringing out my accent.

"Would you have done what I asked if I'd told you?"

I chewed my cheek, realizing what she meant. "No," I said grudgingly.

"Exactly."

She looked thoroughly pleased with herself as though she had proved something. I glanced at Logan who shrugged.

"Now, I want you to stay as calm as you can whilst Logan holds his hand above yours."

The fear was thick in my throat but I fought it back and took deep breaths as Logan held his hand steady above mine. There wasn't even the slightest tremble. I was shaking like a leaf. I kept pulling away and it was several times before I was vaguely comfortable with his hand being so close.

It was also several more sessions and days later before Logan was able to touch my hand fleetingly without having to instantly take his hand away. In that short moment, I felt the roughness and warmth of his skin against mine and was able to admire the darkness of it compared to mine instead comparing the shades of my gloves.

Somehow, Jubilee got wind of this which ended up with me spending my Saturday afternoon in the mall, shopping for dresses when I could be catching up with homework.

"I can just wear the red dress I wore for Christmas," I said as she dragged me from yet another shop.

"It's Illyana's sixteenth, chica," she said as though it were the answer to everything. "You can't wear that to Peter's sister's sweet sixteen." She led me into a small boutique-style shop. "You've gotta have something cool which screams 'I'm almost touchable'."

"I'm"-

"Zip it. Find a cool dress that we agree on and I promise I'll get off your back." She threw me a sly grin. "Anyway, we need a dress to say to Logan that you're not a little girl anymore."

"Jubilee!" Was it that obvious? "We're just good friends."

"Oh, really." She rolled her eyes. "Now, find a dress."

I sighed and began browsing around, trying to find a dress that would cover my skin as well as compensate for my stupid cast. I'd tried on various dresses with billowing sleeves but I looked as though I was drowning in them.

My hand brushed over something that felt velvety even through the silk of my glove and I looked round to see a simple black dress on the hanger. It had an asymmetrical sleeve design, no sleeve on the side of my cast and a full length sleeve on the other. Checking that Jubilee was occupied, I took it off the hanger and headed to the fitting rooms at the back of the shop. I changed out of my clothes and shimmied into the dress, a difficult task with my clumsy cast.

I was shocked at the result. The dress's neckline and nicked waistline emphasized my curves but didn't overindulge them and the length was long enough for comfort. Weirdly, the cast didn't look odd with the dress, nor did my glove. I could wear a pair of funky printed tights and some patent heels with it, something I'd been wanting to try for a while.

"Now that's a dress that'll get Logan's heart going, chica."

I nearly leapt out of my skin.

"Jesus Christ, Jubilee!" I exclaimed as I whirled round to find her stood in the doorway of my cubicle. "Can't you knock?"

"I saw you sneak off so I thought I'd better come and have a look." She eyed me closely. "You're gonna have to get that dress."

I turned back to the mirror and ran my hands over the fabric. "I guess I'll have to."


	11. Chapter 11

Sleep wasn't being kind to me. I tossed and turned, switched my bed around so my pillow was where my feet were supposed to be but the Sandman seemed to have other ideas.

I yawned and sat up, kneading my eyes. Clothes, magazines, homework, books and make-up were strewn across the floor, most of it hidden in shadow and a good booby trap if anyone tried to come in. Pulling on a pair of socks, a sock on my cast arm and the closest silk glove I could find, I padded down to the kitchen. The mansion was silent, just the occasional creak of a floorboard and rattle of a pipe. The kitchen was flooded with moonlight pouring in through the windows, casting shadows dancing across the walls as I opened up the fridge for some water.

"Likin' the mismatched socks," said a low voice from the corner.

I spun to find Logan leaning back in a chair and lighting a cigar, a beer bottle on the windowsill next to him. Then I looked down and discovered I'd put my owl printed sock on my hand, a knee-high penguin sock on my right foot and a knee-high galactic sock on my left. I rapidly felt rather stupid and a little exposed in my gym shorts and spaghetti strap top

"It was dark," I said in my defense, taking him in. He was dressed in his usual jeans, wifebeater and plaid shirt, though had no belt, and his hair was mussed like he'd been tossing in bed like me. "Couldn't sleep?"

"Nope. You?"

"Same." I poured some cold water into a glass and returned the jug back to the fridge. "Stryker?" I asked

He shook his head, taking a drag of his cigar. "Old memories."

I set the glass on the table and hopped up onto it, crossed-legged and facing Logan. He was mainly in shadow, the cigar tip glowing orange when he took a puff. "You chaperoning for Illyana's party tomorrow?"

"'Ro wants me to."

"But that doesn't mean you want to," I said with a grin. I picked up my glass. "Please come."

"It's a tee-total party."

"I'm sure you're not incapable of sneaking some beer in."

He grunted, downed the rest of his bottle and turned his gaze out of the window. I took the moment to study him. The perpetual frown and tightness round his jaw were hardly there and his shoulders were loose. It was as though my company was relaxing him which made me proud since he deserved some time to be himself without having to worry about the school and the kids he had unwittingly become guardian of.

"Do yeh wanna practice?"

Logan's voice shook me out of my reverie. His hazel eyes burned my skin as they searched my face for an answer.

"I'm kind of tired, just to warn you," I said, taking off my glove and placing it beside me.

He shrugged and lifted up his chair, putting it in front of me. "I heal, Marie."

He had a point, as usual.

I scratched the corner of my eye as he held out his hand, so trusting, so willing, so nonchalant as to what could happen if I couldn't hold my mutation back. I held mine three inches above his and breathed as slowly as possible, counting to ten with each one. Fear bubbled under the surface, threatening to break free as it always did, like I had let it for four years. I'd let it control me, let it dictate what I could and couldn't do rather than work to overcome it.

The initial, instinctive fear faded and I dropped my hand to two inches above his. Not seeming at all bothered, he took a drag on his cigar and gradually exhaled the smoke, an opaque cloud glowing silver in the moonlight.

I dropped my hand closer and closer to Logan's, fighting the fear and concentrating on my breathing. My hand was close enough that I was beginning to experience the customary pull of my skin yearning for someone's essence. I pushed it down, a sudden desperate desire to touch Logan's skin rushing through me, and I gingerly placed my hand on his.

It was even better than earlier that day when I'd managed to touch him for nearly ten seconds. Then, there had been a faint pull, but now, there was nothing. Just the rough feel of Logan's hand beneath mine. I could almost feel the ridges of his fingerprints under my hypersensitive tips, so used to being incased in silk, the warmth and life in the thrum of his pulse. I marveled once more at the differences between our hands; the lightness and the darkness, the big and the small, the smoothness and the roughness.

I looked up at Logan to find him watching me intently. There was an expression in his eyes I'd never seen before, anger and longing warring with each other. He threaded his fingers through mine and pulled gently, sliding me along the table inexorably towards him. I had no concern of my bare knees as he-

A sudden piercing scream rang through the night, jerking me from whatever trance I'd been trapped in and switching on my skin. Logan streamed into my mind for a brief moment, a kaleidoscope of memories and feelings, before I was able to yank my hand away. The slight ache in my shoulder from the weight of the cast vanished as his healing factor got to work.

"Theresa," I breathed, gazing at the kitchen doorway.

Glancing over my shoulder to check Logan was suffering no ill effects of my mutation, I leapt off the table, swiping up my glove as I did so, and sprinted out of the kitchen.

"Rogue?" yelled a frantic sounding Ororo. "Rogue! Where are you?"

"I'm here!" I called, watching her appear at the top of the stairs as Logan stopped beside me.

"It's them," she said to him. "You have to follow the plan. Now!"

I was grateful I'd put my glove back on as he grabbed my wrist and dragged me down the corridor towards the garage.

"What's happening?" I demanded, nearly slipping as we rounded a corner at high speed.

"Magneto," he growled, dodging a group of students coming in the opposite direction.

There was a loud crash followed by a thud and a scream. Kitty suddenly emerged before us and we almost ran through her.

"There's more than we thought," she gasped. "Ororo says you'll have to forget the bag and use the use the hidden BUG bag." She vanished.

Logan's following words could've shriveled the ears of a seasoned drunken sailor. He wheeled us round and we shot back along the corridor, pushing past students racing to the safety of the hidden network of tunnels throughout the mansion. We sprinted past the staircase only to be met by two black clad figures wearing helmets with visors.

Logan released his claws and charged at them, stabbing them both in the chest before they had a chance to do anything. He seized my wrist again and we continued along the corridor.

"Where are we going?" I shouted as gunfire sounded several floors up, adding to the pounding of my heart in my ears.

He growled, shoving open a half-hidden door and revealing the clear night. Black silhouettes sprinted across the lawns towards the mansion, some with guns, the laser lights flitting over the ivy-covered walls, and others clearly prepping their powers.

"Get into the woods without being seen," he snarled, pushing me forward and closing the door after him.

I stumbled, the damp grass soaking my soaks, and Logan took hold of my hand, pulling me forwards. Someone yelled and gunfire added to the cries and crashes of the night. Geysers of dirt sprayed up everywhere as we dashed over the dark lawns, my arms and legs pounding in tandem.

"She's getting away!" bellowed a voice behind us. "Shoot the big guy!"

Logan growled, gunshots ringing out, then staggered as he was hit. But he ploughed on, determined to get me into the woods for whatever reason. Over the noise, I heard booted feet chasing after us, thudding heavily on the ground, and the rattle of weapons and equipment.

"C'mon, kid," muttered Logan. "You gotta run."

"I am running!" I protested, the ground becoming covered in twigs and dead leaves which dug into my feet.

"Do it faster!"

More gunshots resounded through the night. My breath was ragged in my chest and my legs were burning despite the hit from Logan's healing factor. Time seemed to stretch for an eternity, the woods seeming to move further and further away as we struggled to get closer, and the gunshots seemed to intensify.

The edge of the woods were a few meters away when Logan suddenly threw us to the ground, tumbling and pinning me under him as the world seemed to explode, chunks of earth raining down on us. Nothing but the sound of a sharp ringing filled my ears as Logan was yanked off me, disappearing from sight. I rolled, the world a little fuzzy, and blinked, trying to see where he had gone. Something flew past the corner of my eye and I lurched back to avoid it, scrambling to my feet. I caught sight of Logan who was busy fending three black-clad guys at once, the moonlight turning their shadows into a flurry of movement on the ground.

Someone was shouting something except my ears were too full of ringing to understand it. I would've thought Logan's healing factor might've helped. It was obviously having a momentary break.

An object flitted past me. I started and saw it was another black-clad figure, their helmet visor glinting menacingly in the moonlight. They lunged at me, gloved hands outstretched to reach for me. I didn't really think of what I was doing as I swung my cast round and slammed it into their neck, sending them crumpling to the ground. I nearly followed, my shoulder complaining painfully. But I had little time to gather myself together before a familiar hand grasped my mine and hauled me in the direction of the woods.

"I told you to come in here!" Logan growled as we entered the fringes of the wood.

"Couldn't hear anything," I gasped, dodging a tree. "How…much further?" There is only so much support a spaghetti strap top can give you and when you're my size, that's hardly anything.

He slowed, letting go of me and rushed to a large pile of leaves. Retracting his claws and sweeping the leaves aside, he revealed Scott's motorbike, sitting in all its pride and glory in the moonshine. He slung a leg over the seat, started the ignition and glanced back at me.

"Get on." He jumped the kick-start and the engine roared to life.

I hurriedly clambered on behind him, wrapping my arms round his warm broad chest as five men burst out of the trees, guns and voices raised. Logan twisted the throttle roughly and the bike snarled, fishtailing on the leaf litter. Finding traction, it sped us off into the darkness of the night.


	12. Chapter 12

"Where are we going?" I yelled over the howl of wind.

"Away," I heard him growl, the bike bumping onto a narrow road at high-speed.

I pressed myself closer to Logan and tightened my arms around his waist, gleaning his warmth as the frigid night air burnt my exposed flesh and whipped my hair about. Everything was becoming strangely reminiscent of the time when Stryker attacked the mansion. The scream, the surprise attack, fleeing with Logan, winding through woods at night…

Logan suddenly tensed and glanced over his shoulder, eyes locking on to something before hunching low and urging the bike to go faster. The snarl of powerful engines reached my ears over the roar of the bike's engine and I turned to see the outline of several sleek motorbikes rapidly gaining ground on us.

"How are we going to get away?" I hollered.

His answer was to abruptly yank the handlebars left and send us whizzing back through the trees, bouncing painfully over roots and stones. The roar followed us, easily keeping up with us despite not having a headlight to follow.

"It's not working!"

"Give me a minute, kid."

Gunfire suddenly sounded. I ducked, peeking under my arm and watched in dismay as the headlights grew closer and closer as though the trees, roots and rocks were not there. Then I spotted the flash of a visor in the mottled moonlight.

"They've got night vision!" I added, trying to keep the panic from my voice.

More gunshots rang out, clear over the roar of Scott's bike and bullets hit the metalwork, clanging forebodingly. My grip involuntarily tightened so I could feel the ripples of Logan's washboard abs imprinted on my palms through his shirt.

He swore. "Marie!" he yelled, swerving sharply and nearly sending me flying off the bike. "Yeh remember that film 'Knight and Day' yeh made me watch a coupla months ago?"

"Yeah?"

Gunfire rattled from behind us, kicking up geysers of dirt.

"Remember the motorbike scene?"

"Yeah?"

"I need yeh to do what the chick does and shoot the fuckin' guys off our tail."

"In case you've forgotten, I have an arm in a cast!"

"I know!" he bellowed. "Two pistols in the saddlebag! Just do it!"

Somehow keeping a hold of Logan with my cast arm which would have every doctor cringing, I reached down and fumbled with the flap of the leather saddlebag, being jostled about as the chase seemed to increase impossibly with speed. Getting the flap open, my hand grazed cold metal and I grabbed the two guns. They were a pair of semi-automatic Heckler and Koch pistols.

"I've got them!" I put one in each hand. The Logan in my head adjusted my grip on them.

The real Logan lifted his left arm, an invitation for me to climb round. I swung a leg up, hooked it round his waist as he grabbed mine, and swung round, locking my legs round him to stay in place so I was now facing backwards whilst sitting in his lap with my arms over one of his shoulders. I counted three bikes weaving in and out of the trees.

It was a little awkward trying to take aim with my cast arm, the ever-changing dim light and keeping my skin away from his but I managed, getting the closest bike in my sights and aiming for the wheels. I pulled the trigger and bullets ripped out, the muzzle lighting up. Adrenaline was making my hands shake, the bullets missing by a mile until Logan's hours of training and the Logan in my head kicked in, shifting my aim and the tires of the bike exploded, rubber spraying everywhere. The bike bucked up into the air, the guy flying off into the darkness.

The remaining guys appeared to take into account of what I'd just done and switched their target from Logan and I to the tires of Scott's bike. I rapidly moved my sights and fired in an arc. As I did so, Logan took to moment to turn sharply to the right and my shot went horrifically wide. However, it did mean that the guys missed as well and I had a momentary advantage. Another bike lost its tires and its rider.

I could imagine the expression of the last guy, most likely a grimace under his mirrored visor as he revved the engine and grew closer. His gun was raised and the muzzle flashed, gunfire ringing in my ears. Within moments he was down, left in a pile of shredded rubber. But not before a bullet hit Logan in the back.

"Are you okay?" I asked pulling back, feeling his stiffen all over.

His eyes were wide, though not with pain. Instead, they were filled with horror as his nostrils flared.

"Fuckin’ shit, Marie," he said in an agonized voice, skidding the bike to a stop.

I frowned, "What's wrong?"

"Don't look down, darlin'," he whispered, gingerly taking the guns from my hands and holding me. "Promise me yeh won't look down."

Of course, anyone confronted with that statement, does so and I did, especially since he'd never called me 'darling' before. And I regretted it immediately. Pain flooded all my senses as I took in the bloody mess blooming across my stomach at an alarming rate.

"I-I th-thought…" I mumbled, the world becoming fuzzy. "I thought…y-our…heal…"

Even Logan's arms were not enough to keep the blackness from swooping in, abolishing the blinding pain and making me see the stars.

 -:-:-

 I awoke groggily to the strong scent of sandalwood, cinnamon, cigar smoke and a faint watery smell I couldn't quite put my finger one. A slow thud and a steady swish filled my ear along with clanking, a low buzzing and muffled talking. I was pressed to something very warm and comfy.

"Marie?" whispered a gravelly voice.

I groaned, feeling as though I had a heavy cold but with none of symptoms and desperate for more sleep.

"Marie, can you hear me?"

I groaned again and cracked open my eyes to see I was pulled against Logan's side. The man in question was peering anxiously down at me. The water smell changed a sweet, honey-like aroma as he took me in, the corners of his hazel eyes relaxing.

Suddenly, everything poured into my mind; the scream, the run, the motorbike, the chase, the guns…the bullet wound.

Leaping out of Logan's arms and off the bed, I barely took in the cheap motel room and the fact I had no cast on as I rushed to the splotchy mirror and yanked up my bloody top. Underneath, my stomach was flat and smooth, illuminated by the sunlight filtering through the grimy window, all the blood having been absorbed by my top. There was no sign that I'd received Logan's through-and-through bullet.

The buzzing was the lamp on the plastic-y table next to the bed with its hideous sheets. The clanking was pipes in the walls. The talking, something about missing garden gnomes, was muffled enough for me to suspect it was coming through at least two walls. I started. How did I-?

I whirled round. "Did you use my skin?" I demanded.

A solid bittersweet smell mixed in with the honey-like scent, emotions, as Logan threw me a steely look. "You woulda died if I hadn't," he said shortly.

Anger flared up in my chest from the invasion of privacy. "You know how much I hate using my skin."

Logan stood and marched over to me. "I know yeh do," he snapped, "but it was either live or die. It was the only way I coulda helped."

"I asked you not to"- I started.

"Yeh were dyin'!" he exploded.

I flinched at the tone of his voice. "I asked you, and you promised, you wouldn't use my mutation again after the Statue of Liberty," I gritted through my teeth.

He turned swiftly on his heel with a snarl. "Yeh were dyin', Marie. I had no choice."

"How long?"

He spun back round to face me. "What?"

"How long did you press your skin to mine?"

"Long enough," he growled.

The anger and indignation fled from me and I sank to the floor. Logan's willingness to use my skin to help save me without a second thought for himself shocked me to the core, more potent than my irritation. He'd done it once, knew the effects and I knew he loathed the suffocating pain it caused him, losing his life force, but he didn't care. He'd done it and saved my life again.

I looked round to find Logan watching me, knowing he would be able to tell that I wasn't angry at him anymore. Instead, I felt embarrassed and very exposed, what with no gloves, socks or cast. Yet, he sat down beside me and wrapped an arm around me like I was fully covered. I turned and buried my face into his chest, taking a deep breath of him. Either the Logan in my head had absorbed the healing factor or it was fading because his scent wasn't as strong. The sounds were also fading back to normal.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled.

"For what?"

"Being an ass."

He chuckled, a low rumble in my ear. "I woulda asked yeh but yeh were kinda out of it and knowin' you, you woulda taken too long on the pleasantries. Anyway, yeh're always an ass."

I elbowed him then wish I hadn't, my funny bone smarting from colliding with an adamantium rib. "What are we going to do now?"

"Go 'n' have a shower and we'll talk 'bout it."


	13. Chapter 13

The hot water drummed against my skin, making it glow with heat as I scrubbed it clean with a strangely colored liquid from a bottle claiming it was shampoo, conditioner and body wash. I doubted how well it really worked but at least I didn't have to scour away dried blood. Stepping out of the shower, I wrapped a skimpy towel round me which was barely longer than one of Jubilee's clubbing dresses. Something tingled in my chest at the idea that I was practically naked with Logan next door in full knowledge.

I dried myself, moved and reached over the sink to wipe off the condensation fogging the mirror. My cheeks were flushed, white strands sticking to them, and a bead of water trickled its way down like a tear. I swiped it away and stepped back, feeling something squelch underfoot. Looking down, I realised just how cheap the motel was. Water covered the floor and my top had fallen off the side, the squelch-y thing I'd trodden on. Brilliant…

I dithered in front of the door. The towel scarcely covered my modesty and Logan would have a heart attack if he saw so much toxic flesh exposed. But I couldn't put my sopping top on because it would be transparent.

"Logan?" I finally called, opening the door and peering round.

He looked up from where he was spread out on the bed, his eyes widening at the sight of me. He blinked. "Yeah, kid?"

"The shower's leaked everywhere and I don't have a top to wear," I said, gripping the towel tightly and feeling as though he was seeing right through it.

"So yeh want my shirt, I'm guessin'."

I grinned. "If ya don't mahnd."

He rolled his eyes and unbuttoned his shirt to reveal his customary wifebeater underneath, stained with dried blood and tucked into the big Indian belt buckle holding up his faded jeans. He walked over, handing me his shirt which was also stained.

"Some of this mine?" I asked, taking it from him.

He nodded.

I thanked him and retreated back into the bathroom, locking the door behind me. Tugging on my gym shorts, I slipped on his shirt and sighed. In the mirror, I looked as though I was swimming in it, completely dwarfed. The sleeves finished past my fingertips, the hem below the bottom of my shorts and it was so baggy, it hid the fact I wasn't wearing a bra. Another plus was that it was warm and smelt of Logan. I tossed my ruined top in the bin and hung my towel on the rail, leaving the bathroom and sitting on the end of the bed Logan was propped up on.

"Yeh took yeh time," he said, pulling a cigar from his back pocket.

"The water was warm." I bunched the cuffs in my hands to cover them and glanced at the window, noting the sunlight. "How long was I out for?"

"Coupla hours," he answered, lighting the cigar and taking a deep drag.

"Any news from Ororo?"

He shook his head, exhaling the smoke.

"Where are we?"

"'Bout a hundred miles north of the mansion."

"How did you get me here?"

"Yeh gonna keep playin' 'Twenty Questions'?"

"It's not like you're giving any info away," I pointed out, pulling the hem of the shirt over my knees to avoid touching his bare feet.

He grunted, taking another drag. "Used yeh skin and rode here on the bike," he said, breathing out the smoke.

I dropped my gaze to my hands as a thought slowly occurred to me. "Why was the bike hidden in the woods?" I frowned. "And why did Ororo say you had to 'follow the plan'?"

He didn't answer straight away. Instead, he took another puff of his cigar, stubbed it out and set it on the bedside table, exhaling the opaque smoke before folding his arms, studying me. "There's been word in some of the underground mutant organizations that someone was lookin' for a girl who kinda matched yeh description," he said. "Ororo came up with the idea that we should do somethin' in case anythin' happened; hide the bike in the woods; hide a goods bag here; hide another car here."

"But you never told me about this."

"Didn't wanna scare yeh. Ororo's idea."

Always treating me like a delicate child… "Is there money in the goods bag?"

"Yeah, one of the Professor's credit cards and ten thousand dollars in cash."

I smiled slyly. "Good, because we need to go shopping."

Logan's face was enough to tell me he didn't think we needed to.

 -:-:-

 It took a while but I finally managed to convince him. Coming up with a cover story for our messy clothes and lack of shoes, we scouted out the goods bag (tucked behind an air-conditioning unit) and the car (an old Shelby Mustang round the back of the motel).

"Real discreet," I said as Logan pulled the dumpster hiding it aside.

He threw me a withering look, took the keys from the bag and climbed in, starting the engine with a loud rev. I clambered into the passenger seat, glad to be out of the cold weather, and hardly had a chance to do up my seatbelt before the car shot off.

After we'd bought some food from a small deli and devoured it, we found a Wal-Mart, parking in the massive car park outside. Several people threw us scandalized looks at our bare feet and ill-equipped clothes as we crossed the lot to the warehouse-sized building and by the time we reached inside, I was frozen, my feet numb with cold, and I felt naked with so much of my leg exposed.

"I'm going to have to dress up like an Eskimo for the next week if I ever want to warm up again," I muttered, heading towards the clothing section with my arms wrapped round me.

"Don't think Wal-Mart sells seal furs," said Logan.

I rolled my eyes and began browsing the hangers and shelves for what I wanted. I kept furtively glancing at the lingerie section I was in dire need of but Logan's dog-like presence prevented me from walking straight to it. He didn't need to see my crappy choice in underwear. Anyway, the prospect was mortifying. I put it off by arguing with him instead.

"You need more than what you're wearing now."

"I just need some shoes," he said shortly.

"And another shirt and wifebeater and underwear"-

"Don't wear underwear."

I stared at him before dropping my gaze to the floor, my cheeks burning. "I really needed to know that, Logan."

He chuckled. "I've been watchin' you eyin' up the underwear department for the last ten minutes so I guess you wear it."

"Most of the female species tend to," I retorted. "Anyway, back to what I was saying." I glared at him over my pile of clothes clutched in my arms. "People are going to gawk at you if you have blood on your clothes."

"I'll tell 'em I'm a butcher."

Steeling my nerves, I turned and walked towards the lingerie area. "I don't think many people will believe you."

"I'll wash 'em."

"The Wolverine hand-washing his clothes?" I snorted. "What are you going to wear when everything needs a wash?"

There was no answer.

"Besides, you said we've got ten thousand dollars in cash and one of the Professor's credit cards," I pointed out. "It's not like we're short of money."

There was no answer again but I figured I'd convinced him.

Logan stood to the side of the lingerie department, leaning against a stand with his arms folded as he watched me picking out various bras and panties, making me feel a little self-conscious about my choices. A gaggle of girls walked past him, laughing and chatting. One glanced round, spotted Logan and nudged her friend, batting her eyelashes at him.

Jealously reared its ugly head in my chest and I felt my lips tighten. Fighting it down, I ducked my head below the shelves to avoid seeing him with them. There was no need for me to be so jealous since he wasn't mine. But it didn't stop me from peeking over the top. Relief flooded me as I saw he was ignoring them, much to their disappointment. However, it did mean that they immediately scanned the department for whoever he was with. Which was me.

I ducked back down, grabbing a lacy green bra in my size and adding it to my pile. Bracing myself for their snide looks, I walked round and kept my head low as I headed to Logan.

"Yeh got what yeh want, kid?" he asked, straightening up.

"Yep," I answered, ignoring the girls' whispers and glares. "And it's your turn."

"Marie"-

"Logan," I said, pushing in him the direction of the men's department. "Move your ass before I whoop it."

He grumbled and grudgingly made his way towards the men's which was noticeably smaller than the women's. He half-heartedly pulled what he wanted from the racks, muttering under his breath. Then it was over to the toiletries section which made him mutter even more.

"Be my guest if you want to stink to high heaven," I told, dropping some deodorant and shampoo into a trolley we'd found, though I doubted Logan could ever stink. "I'd rather not. And I don't want knotty hair or smelly breath or"-

"Alright!" he cut in, tossing some unscented soap into the trolley as well. "I get it, kid."

I grasped the soap and put it back on the shelf. "So, why are you complaining?" I took hold of a bottle of jasmine scented shower-gel.

"I'm not." He took the bottle from my hand and set it back in the shelf.

"You are." I dropped the back into the trolley with a clunk.

"I'm not." He put the bottle back on the shelf.

"You are." I picked it up.

"Will yeh just leave the damn thing on the shelf?" He yanked it from my hand. "I'm not usin' some girly shit soap."

"We're having it, whether you like it or not." I snatched it back and dumped it in the trolley.

He scowled at me but said nothing, fighting a small smirk playing round his mouth.

We also bought a rucksack each to put our things in and I managed to find a pair of black, full length gloves. It was a relief, after we'd paid, to put them on, the edgy feeling I'd been having since stepping out of the motel room fading. Logan shifted everything of his from the shopping bags into his rucksack though left out his newly purchased boots, a shirt, packet of wifebeaters, socks and his jacket on the bonnet of the Shelby once we returned to the car.

"What are you going?" I asked, shivering in the cold because he hadn't yet opened the car.

"Changin'," he answered, pulling off his bloodied wifebeater, tossing it aside and tugging on a clean one. "They reek." He tucked in his top and put on the rest of his clothes.

I watched the muscles ripple as he moved, wondering what they would feel like under my bare hands.

His voice brought me back to reality. "The tint's dark enough on car," he said. "Yeh can change outta what yeh wearin' in there."

It was cramped in the car but I coped. Putting on my underwear was the worst, the constant niggling thought in the back of my mind that someone was going to look in. I hid under Logan's shirt and slipped into them then into some jeans, a t-shirt, boots, scarf and a nice duffle coat and shoved my remaining things into the rucksack. Climbing back out, I found Logan leaning against the bonnet of the car, arms folded and a cigar hanging from his mouth. His eyes raked over me before resting on my face.

"Yeh ready?"

I nodded.


	14. Chapter 14

"C'mon, Marie."

"We're in a car, Logan."

"And?"

"What happens if something goes wrong?"

"I'll heal."

I glanced at him over the console, arms folded firmly across my chest. "But you'll be out for a few minutes and you're on a highway. In case you haven't notice, that's not the best idea."

"Yeh were fine back at the mansion," he said, overtaking a slow truck.

"Until Magneto's men arrived and it turned back on," I pointed out.

He rolled his eyes. "It didn't even hurt, kid. Just take the glove off and start practisin'."

"Logan"-

"'Ro'll have a fit if she finds out yeh haven't been practicin'."

I scowled at him, knowing he was right. Grudgingly, I slid off my gloves, laid them on my lap and found Logan was already holding out a hand, waiting patiently on the gear shift. I started my breathing exercises, calming myself as I watched my hand grow nearer and nearer to his as though it had a mind and will of its own.

Yes, I was reluctant to practice in fear my mutation would harm him but I also feared that if it switched on too many times, I would collect enough information and discover what he really thought about me. I had no desire to know of his platonic and the deeply-rooted 'kid' view of me. The regular name-calling was enough to tell me it was deep enough that nothing would ever happen. And, it also allowed me to play along with the fantasy of him one day sweeping me off my feet and declaring his undying love. A little corny and sickly but every gal's gotta have a dream.

My hand brushed his, jerking me from my train of thought. I pulled away automatically and earned a sideways eyebrow raise from him. Mentally shaking myself, I slowly pressed my bare palm to his and forced down my body's instinctive reaction to suck him dry. I sat silently, staring at my hand on his, wonderstruck it was even happening and that he was willing to let me practice on him. He'd been subjected to my mutation more times than anyone else yet he was the only one prepared to experience it again.

The drone of the car wheels on the tarmac and my mind's complete focus on keeping my skin at bay had me so entranced it took several seconds for me to register Logan's voice and the shrill ring of a mobile phone.

"That'll be 'Ro," I heard him say.

Yanking my hand from his, I hurriedly rummaged round in his bag for the phone, embarrassed by my spellbound attitude to the merest touch. I found it, an old-style pay-as-you-go, tucked at the bottom beneath the money and clothes and read the screen – Storm.

"Hello, Ororo," I said, answering it.

"Rogue." The relief in her voice was blatant. "Is Logan there?"

I handed him the phone and swiftly tugged my gloves back on, a sense of security washing over me. Frustration bubbled in my chest at this. Why did I have to be so dependant on covering all of my skin, always anxious unless I had my security blanket? Why did it have to be so hard to control my mutation?

I glared at the foot well like it was to blame, arms folded once more, and decided to listen to the one-sided conversation Logan was having with Ororo.

"…so yeh got the fucker, then," he said. "What did he say?" There was a long pause before he chuckled and said, "So yeh cranked up yeh lightnin', I'm guessin', to make him talk." Another pause followed but the humor faded rapidly to be replaced by fury. His hand tightened on the steering wheel, his claws rippled under his skin and his foot grew heavy on the gas, the engine growing louder. We were soon flying along the motorway, little care for police or speed cameras. "Alright, 'Ro," he said through gritted teeth and hung up, tossing the phone aside. It clattered to the floor of the foot well.

He gripped the steering with both hands, staring straight ahead with a brutal expression on his face as the car continued to speed up.

"Logan?" I said tentatively, unsure what Ororo could've said to make him go like this. "Logan, what's wrong?"

He said nothing, aggressively overtaking an RV. I had no concern at the speed we were at with him driving. I was concerned, however, about other people and what they might do. A visit from the highway police would not be a good idea and would not improve his mood.

"Logan, either I'm making you stop the car," I said, "or you tell me what's going on, right now."

He snarled and hit the steering wheel. I was surprised it stayed on.

"Logan," I warned.

"'Ro's found out what Magneto wants from yeh from someone they caught durin' the attack," he ground out.

Hundreds of nasty thoughts flooded my head of what he could want from me and thousands of questions swirled in with them. Panic mixed in with the chaos, memories of the Statue of Liberty concocting possible scenarios, each one worse than the next.

"Marie, look at me," he said, scenting my fear, and I had no other option. His hazel eyes were burning intensely and the furrow in his brow was deep as he fleetingly took his eyes from the road. "I promise nothin' is gonna happen to yeh."

I swallowed, everything suddenly becoming so very real. There had been no definite conformation that Magneto and his Brotherhood wanted me. Having Logan tell me that Magneto wanted me again for some evil plan was like a having a two-by-four swung into my stomach.

"No one,  _no one_ , will touch yeh, if yeh don't want 'em to, Marie," he told me.

"What does he want?" I breathed.

Logan stared resolutely out of the windscreen for several moments before glancing at me, sighing like the weight of the world was on his shoulders. "He wants to… _experiment_ …on you," he spat.

"Why?" I felt as though I was going to be sick.

"He wants…this is what 'Ro said…he want to develop a virus." He growled, his jaw working furiously, and he looked as though he wanted to skewer the next car we passed. "He needs yeh DNA for yeh mutation so he can do it."

I drew my knees to my chest in an attempt to ward off the abrupt feeling of vulnerability. "What kinda virus?" I was too worried and scared to be bothered about my accent.

He shrugged, his grip on the steering wheel turning his knuckles white. "'Ro said somethin' 'bout it changin' humans into mutants," he growled.

"It's happenin' again," I whispered. "He usin' meh again."

Logan swore with such force I jumped. "Marie,  _look at me_."

I ignored his order and pressed my face to my knees. "He'll say it's fer the greater good again." Being trapped in the corner of the boat with Magneto baring down on me flashed through my mind. "Ah'm gonna be his puppet again."

"No, yeh not," he growled. "Cos I won't let him."

The fierce protectiveness in his tone made me look up at him. "But he'll hurt ya if ya stand up ter him," I whispered, dropping my head again.

"Oh shit, Marie…"

I barely felt the car slow and the turn signal sound as he moved across the lanes and exited off the highway into a rest area, parking among some trees so we were concealed from other cars. Then, he was pulling me over the middle console and into his lap, my knees falling either side of his hips. He took my face in both hands, unconcerned that his skin was touching mine.

I tried to pull away. Humiliation at my mutation and inadequateness at defending myself burned in my chest and fear of Magneto capturing me and dread of Logan being hurt burned in my eyes. But Logan held on and I was forced to tamp down my skin.

" _Look at me_ ,  _Marie_."

I let my eyes slowly wander up his face, taking in the dark, rough mutton-chops, his strong nose and, finally, his fiery hazel eyes that were watching me closely.

"If Magneto touches yeh, I'll skewer him," he said in a low voice, wiping away my tears with his thumbs. "I'll protect yeh, Marie. I promised yeh that and I'm not gonna break it now. I'll die protectin' yeh."

I hiccupped, my heart twisting agonizingly. It was near impossible to kill Logan but Magneto was frantic to get his hands on me and his mind-set meant it could happen. And it scared me to the core. Logan  _could not_  die.

"Ya can't"- I started, the tears flowing freely.

"I will," he said, drawing me to his chest so my head was tucked under his chin. "No matter what happens, I'll protect you."

I'm not sure how long I cried for, confused, lost and frightened but Logan's scent of sandalwood, cinnamon and faint traces of cigar smoke surrounded me with familiarity, his arms round me provided comfort and the steady thump of his heart in my ear calmed mine. When I pulled away, sniffing and puffy-eyed, I noted the clear sky was darkening and the stars were beginning to twinkle.

Logan tucked a white strand behind my ear and brushed another tear away. "Yeh finished?" he asked softly.

I nodded, glancing down. "Ah kinda ruined ya shirt," I said in a thick voice, gesturing at the wet patch.

He shrugged. "Doesn't matter." He searched my eyes. "Yeh alright to go back to yeh seat?"

I nodded again and shuffled off his lap into my seat, drawing my knees to chest once more. I now felt like a big, blubbering baby, completely over-reacting at a tiny piece of information I'd known in the back of my mind for a while.

"Ah'm sorry," I said, wiping my nose.

"Don't apologize." He reversed out of the parking space.

"But"-

"No apologies. I shoulda told yeh better."

I looked over at him and sighed. What was it with wanting someone you couldn't have?


	15. Chapter 15

_Another night, another hook-up in the seedy side of town. I hadn't drunk much before she looked over the bar, saw me and started pushing her way through the growing crowd._

_"Lookin' for someone, honey?" she drawled, draping an arm over mine._

_Her scent told me she was prepared for what I wanted; a quick fuck that might hurt because I couldn't get what I really craved. I grabbed her arm and my bottle of Jack from the bar and dragged her roughly through the crowd to the grotty alleyway round back, desperate to release the tight tension in my chest. The night air was warm and there was little light except from the stars. Good. I wouldn't have to see the bitch's face._

_Using my body, I pushed her against the brick wall, taking a swing of the whiskey, and hooked her thigh round my hip which pressed her into my aching groin. She moaned her approval and arched into me, raking her nails down the front of my shirt, catching the buttons. I barely felt her push it up along with my wifebeater and tug them over my head, tossing them aside. I took another mouthful of whiskey, pushed her face to one side and pulled up her miserable excuse for a skirt as she wrapped her other leg round me._

_Suddenly, it was all nauseatingly wrong. Revulsion rather than gratifying relief smothered me at the idea of a quick fuck. Her legs weren't long enough, there was too much skin showing, her make-up was too brassy, her scent burnt my nose, her hair was completely the wrong color._

_I wanted_ her _, not this…this replacement._

_With a snarl, I shoved her away and yanked her hands off me._

_"Oh,_ come on _!" she whined. "You started this, honey, you have to finish it."_

_I roared and hurled the bottle at her feet. It shattered, sending glass and whiskey everywhere, and she screamed._

_"Yeh keep yeh hands off me," I growled, stepping back._

_Then I was running, running from the bar, from the bitch, from the disgust raging in my chest. I was running from everything. I couldn't have_ her _and that only made me want_ her _more._

 -:-:-

 I woke up, gasping for breath and filled with an insatiable desire for some unknown person. Groaning, I sat up, kneaded my eyes and stretched. The moonlight was bleeding through the thin curtains covering the window at the foot of the lumpy motel bed Logan and I were sleeping on.

Logan…

I realised what the dream had been; one of Logan's memories.

And the woman he'd been pining for?

She was the one with mile long legs, discreet make-up, clothes that covered enough skin but drew the eye and, of course, bright red hair. But he couldn't have her because she was dead.

I slid out of bed and padded to the door, opening it. The clear, crisp night air washed over me, cooling my feverish skin and dampening the dream's desire. I raked my hand through my hair with a sigh and leant against the door frame.

Why did Logan still want Jean even though she was dead? As my mother had told me before I was kicked out of the house, there's no use crying over spilt milk and that was what Logan was basically doing; lusting for Jean despite not being able to change the events that took her away. I wouldn't mind so much if he wanted her as a friend. Except, he wanted her as a fuck buddy.

I kicked my toe angrily at the door jamb repeatedly, gentle enough I wasn't hopping round the room clutching it but hard enough that the pain distracted me. Why? Why?  _Why_? Why couldn't he love me? Was it my skin? Did he just pretend not to care about it? In reality, did it actually scare him? Was it my age? Did he think I was too young? He'd shagged younger. Was it to do with my virginity and 'innocence'? I may have never done anything but the collection of memories in my head probably made me the least innocent twenty-year-old in the country, possibly the entire world.

I booted the jamb harder and immediately regretted it, pain jolting up my leg. I cursed under my breath, closing the door and sinking to the thinly carpeted floor, rubbing my pulsating toe.

There was a low growl from the bed followed by a rustle of sheets. I looked up and saw Logan tossing and turning, his face twisted in anger as his claws slid out. He growled again, slashing at an invisible specter.

I hurriedly stood, being mindful to keep a distance from the bed.

"Logan?" I called tentatively. "Logan, it's only a nightmare."

He snarled and rolled on to his stomach, his claws flashing in the moonlight and slicing the mattress where I'd been sleeping.

"Logan!" Without meaning to, I stepped closer.

He roared, sitting bolt upright with his knees braced wide as he gouged three deep grooves into the cheap pine headboard, the muscles of his back rippling. Then he swung round and I fleetingly saw golden eyes before something slammed into me, three sharp points pressing painfully under my chin.

"Logan," I breathed, very aware of one of his bare arms encircled round me and touching exposed flesh. "Logan, it's me." I struggled to smother my skin’s automatic reaction, drawing in a fleeting sense of his confusion, anger and panic.

A low growl rumbled through him as he buried his face into the crook of my neck, retracting his claws with a  _sknit_. He pulled me closer to him so I could feel every curve and ripple of his body against my back.

"Logan?"

He exhaled, the breath washing over my skin and making me shiver.

"It's me."

"I know," he whispered. "M'sorry."

I continued to stare at the wall, counting the beats of his thudding heart. "What dream was it?"

My knees nearly buckled from beneath me as he dragged his lips up my neck to the base of my ear. The arm that was pinning both of mine to my sides shifted and slid round my waist. His other hand began tracing the side of my neck, no fear of my skin at all. I was fraught with worry that my skin, which I was still busy trying mute, would turn on and desire as his lips skimmed my earlobe.

"He had yeh," he murmured. "It was all goin' well and then he had yeh."

"Who had me?"

He slowly turned me round and I looked up, amazed at the intensity of his gaze. The moonlight brought out the golden flecks among the green so they glowed.

"Magneto."

And he was having a nightmare about it? "Well, he hasn't got me," I said, brushing his mutton-chops with a bare hand for the first time. "I'm right here."

His eyes searched my face and relief flooded them. He dropped his head back to the crook of my shoulder, his lips trailing a path over my skin and stubble scratching it, igniting a flame in my chest. Sparks were left in a trail behind, burning my hypersensitive skin. My breathing sped up along with his and I could feel it rushing past, warm and moist as my hands, of their own accord, began tracing the muscles of his chest and abdomen, making their way up to his shoulders. His blood and life thrummed through him, warm and buzzing at my fingertips in a way that had never been possible with my gloves and I felt his heart beat strongly beneath my touch. My skin held no concern for me at that moment.

" _Lo-gan_ …" I breathed, turning my face into his hair and breathing in his intoxicating scent.

"M'rie." It was the same voice he used when he’d been dreaming about me.

His lips skimmed my earlobe again, strengthening the flame in my chest, and then moved along my jaw line. My heart started to race as he passed the halfway point on my jaw and traveled upwards towards my lips, the rasp of his stubble satisfying a fervent ache in the pit of my stomach.

Pulling away but leaving barely any breathing room with our noses almost touching, he stared deep into my eyes.

"Please, Logan," I pleaded, digging my nails into his shoulders and relishing resistance of his muscles. " _Please_."

His eyes fluttered close at my voice, groaning, and leant in. I could taste his breath on my tongue, sweeter than I thought for him. He grew closer and closer and-

" ** _Rogue?_** "

I leapt back in shock at the sudden intrusion in my head.

" ** _Do not be alarmed, Rogue._** "

" _Professor_?" I gasped.

" ** _Yes?_** "


	16. Chapter 16

Logan started. " _What_?"

" ** _What's happening, Professor? Where are you?_** " I thought.

"Marie"- Logan started, reaching for me.

I batted his hands away. " ** _Professor? Are you still there?_** "

" ** _Yes, just gathering my strength._** " He paused and I felt a chuckle. " ** _Did I interrupt something between you and Logan?_** "

I felt a blush rise to my cheeks and Logan frowned, though took the hint not to say anything. " ** _Erm…_** "

" ** _It's alright, Rogue,_** " he assured.

" ** _Where are you, Professor?_** " I asked to hide the awkwardness.

" ** _I'm not a hundred percent sure but I do believe I'm in the south of Pennsylvania_** ," he replied. " ** _I must go now for my strength is waning but I will guide you and Logan to where I am._** "

" ** _No, Professor! I_** "-

But he was already gone.

Logan sensed this and immediately grabbed my shoulders, frog-marching me to the bed and sitting me down. "Now, yeh tell what the  _hell_  is goin' on," he demanded.

"The Professor's alive," I said breathlessly. "He's  _alive_!"

He raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Yeh sure?"

"He was talking in my head, Logan, so I'm pretty sure," I answered. "And he wants to see us."

"Are yeh really sure 'bout this?"

"Do I smell like I'm lying?"

"No," he sighed. He looked as though he'd much rather be doing something else rather than talking about whether the Professor was alive or not, reigning himself in as emotions flickered across his face. "Where is he?"

"Somewhere in South Pennsylvania." I reached for my gloves and tugged them on, trying to keep what had been happening between us before the Professor called in from my mind. But it didn't work, my heart beginning to race as I recalled the feel of Logan's lips skimming my skin without fear. "He didn't say where but he said he'd guide me there." My voice was slightly shaky.

"How?"

I shrugged. "He went before I could ask. He sounded weak but he was definitely alive."

He sat down beside me and scrubbed his face with his hand. "We'll leave first thing in the mornin'."

I dropped my gaze to my hands clasped in my lap then looked up at him through my lashes, pouting my lips slightly so I knew he wouldn't be able to say no. I always used 'the face' whenever he was being irritating about chaperoning.

"It's half three in the mornin', Marie."

"And?"

He groaned and got to his feet, picking up his wifebeater and belt from the chair he'd dumped them on, tugging them on. I fought back a smug smile, hopping off the bed, grabbing my bag and locking myself in the bathroom. Hurriedly changing out of my pajamas and putting on whatever I could grab, I slipped on a scarf and the duffle coat I'd become strangely attached to.

Logan was ready by the time I'd finished, stood in shadow by the door with his bag slung on his shoulder and keys in his hand. Somehow, he'd managed to find a motel that still used real keys instead of cards. Only he could do that…

The cool night air cooled my still buzzing skin as we walked to the car parked in the bumpy lot. I gave Logan a sideways glance, climbing into the car, to see if he was affected like me but he didn't appear to be, just a little bleary eyed. So either back in the hotel room was nothing or he was putting on a very good show of looking unaffected. Which sort of annoyed me. Why did he have be as cool as a cucumber in any situation while I had to have crazy thoughts whizzing round my head and have my hands go all clammy?

There was hardly anyone on the roads, just long stretches of darkness and silence, aside for me telling him to head to Pittsburgh. I didn't trust myself to open my mouth and keep from asking him to kiss me. Just the thought of his lips trailing butterfly kisses on my skin was enough to fuel a warmth in the pit of my belly.

The pale, pre-dawn light was starting to inch its way above the horizon and encroach on the dark indigo of night when Logan spoke.

"Yeh wanna practice?" he asked, holding out a hand and resting it on the gear shift.

"It's twenty to five in the morning."

"And we're drivin'." He waggled his fingers. "C'mon. See how long yeh can do it."

I glared at him but took off my glove and placed my hand in his. Last time he had kept his hand flat with mine on top but this time he twined his fingers with mine. I nearly melted in my seat, the heat of his hand reminding me of his lips and sending a spike of desire through me. I hurriedly pushed it down since I knew he would be able to smell it, especially in the confines of the car. Except, the idea that he could smell my arousal just turned me on even more. I tried to pull away but he wouldn't let me, holding on and casting me a heated glance. I swallowed and stared out the window in an attempt to distract my overactive mind from Logan's touch. It showed just how little contact I'd had over the last few years that the simplest gesture could send my body into overdrive. Because my mind was so distracted, I had no worries for my skin. Maybe he knew that and kept pushing for me to practice; distraction and peace stopped my skin from turning on.

The monotonous drone of the wheels on the tarmac, the lack of conversation and the less than adequate night's sleep soon had my eyelids growing heavy. Within minutes, I was asleep, my hand tightly clasped in Logan's hand.

 -:-:- 

"Marie," a voice whispered in my ear.

I groaned and squeezed my eyes tight against the bright light filtering through my lids. "Give meh 'nother five mintzz," I mumbled.

"Yeh gotta tell me where to go," he said.

"Pittsburgh."

"I'm there."

I muttered several choice words under my breath and blearily opened my eyes. Dazzlingly crisp sunshine poured into the car, lighting up the dust motes swirling in the rays. It took me a few moments to realize my hand was still in his.

"How long ah been out?" I asked, taking my hand from his and kneading my eyes.

"It's quarter to eleven," he answered. "Where am I supposed to be goin'?"

I stretched and yawned, looking outside and trying to work out what direction the Professor was leading me by way of a pull just behind the navel. "We go that-a-way," I said, pointing in a general south-easterly direction.

Logan didn't look convinced but flicked the turn signal and left the parking lot he'd pulled up in, joining the speeding cars on the highway. Little conversation passed between us, though there was some sort of tension I couldn't explain as I directed him to where I sensed the Professor was. He said nothing as I pointed to a winding dirt track some twenty miles later that disappeared into a thick green forest.

Just as I was starting to think I'd got my directions wrong, a low white building nestled among the dark, mottled trunks came into view, numerous panoramic windows reflecting the scenery. Several cars were parked in a makeshift lot and large sign by the main entrance read 'Goldsmith Sanatorium' in big gold letters.

"Doesn't look like a hospital," said Logan, cutting the engine.

"The Professor's inside." I climbed out of the car and shivered, the cold finding its way to my skin. "I hope he's inside."

Logan got out and did something he'd never done before. He walked round to the passenger side of the car and took hold of my hand in his before walking to the doors with me in tow. I was a little shocked at the gesture but it was nothing compared to the surge of desire that had my cheeks flushing. His warmth bled through my gloves.

Inside was clean and almost utilitarian, a well-dressed lady sat behind a large reception desk. It wasn't until Logan cleared his throat rather loudly did she take any notice of us. The corner of her eyes tightened upon seeing our somewhat scruffy appearances.

"How may I help you?" she asked in a crisp voice.

"We're lookin' for a Charles Xavier," said Logan, keeping my hand in his. I could feel the tension in his grip, the scent of the building probably setting his nerves on edge.

She nodded and pressed a button on a board next to her. A few seconds later the sound of heels on laminate reached my ears, a dark haired woman appearing in a doorway to our left. Her hair was pulled back in a messy bun and she was dressed in a white lab coat, pens in its breast pocket and a stethoscope round her neck.

"You must be Logan and Rogue," she said in a soft Scottish accent, walking towards us with a hand outstretched. "I'm Dr Moira MacTaggert. Charles has been telling me all about you."

Logan shook her hand. "Where is he?"

"If you'll follow me." She turned on her heel and walked back through the doorway she'd come through. "I warn you, he might not be as you remember him."

"What do you mean?" I demanded as we followed after her.

"Well, one, he's been in a coma for nearly eighteen months and two, he has a…different appearance," she replied, glancing over her shoulder.

"When did he wake up?" Logan's hand tightened round mine.

"He was showing signs of coming round for several weeks but it was a few days that he fully regained conscience." She stopped in front of a closed door. "He's in here. Be gentle with him." She gently opened the door. "Just press the call button if you need anything."

I was suddenly apprehensive of seeing the Professor. I'd acknowledged he was dead only for the acceptance to be completely obliterated into tiny little smithereens. Swallowing and leaning into Logan for support, I entered the room.

A sweeping panoramic window spanned the outside wall, a beautiful scene of swaying dark green trees contrasting with the clear blue sky. The room itself was spacious yet cozy at the same time, warm yet clinical.

I slowly allowed my eyes to wander to the bed in the middle of the room, swathed in a white sheet that reached the floor. It was a moment or two before I was able to let myself look at the person lying in the bed.

"Hello, Rogue. Logan."

It was an incredibly strange sensation taking them in. The person was definitely the Professor and he most definitely wasn't. It was like the person in the bed was merging with the Professor, his facial features bleeding through theirs. And his voice was exactly as I remembered it.

"Professor," I said, my voice cracking on the last syllable, realizing he was really alive, sitting and breathing in front of me.

"Mornin' Chuck," said Logan

"I see you found me successfully."

"How are you?" I asked.

"Not too bad, but being awake is much better than being asleep."

Then I blurted out the question I suspect was also ploughing through Logan's mind. "How can you be alive?" Logan's hand became a death grip.

The Professor smiled. "I think you missed the lesson which would answer your question." He adjusted the way he was sitting. "I was theorizing that, with telepathically capable mutants who have the right skills, the conciseness could be transferred from one body to another so those who have badly damaged bodies could have a full functioning body once again."

"And you tried out your theory?"

He nodded. "It took a while to settle into the body, but yes. Moira and I had talked about the hypothesis for several months. We were unable to test it because we had no suitable candidates until this man arrived here at Goldsmith. He had no family or friends so we were trialing things when the incident with Jean occurred. I decided it would be best to put our plans into action."

"You could've told us," I said quietly, Logan pulling me into his side. "There's a headstone in the grounds with your name on it and we keep a candle burning."

"I'm sorry for not being where I was needed most."

There was a silence before Logan said, "Yeh said yeh wanted to see us."

"Yes." He coughed, a deep hacking sound and I pulled away in horror, only just noting the faintly flushed cheeks and sweaty sheen to his forehead, too busy with the fact that he was  _alive_.

"I thought you said you were okay," I told him.

"I am. It's a slight chest infection, nothing more."

I frowned, immediately knowing he was downplaying it but said nothing as he turned his attention to Logan.

"I believe Magneto is planning something involving Rogue," he said.

"He's tried to get his hands on her twice already," said Logan.

"I'm sorry to hear that." A sudden fit of debilitating coughing overcame him, his face flooding with color. "You…" he spluttered, "-the…"

I rushed forwards. "What do you need, Professor?"

"He needs rest," answered Moira briskly, entering the room. Her whole demeanor had changed. "I'm sorry but I'm going to have to ask you to leave." She grasped my shoulder and steered me back from the bed.

I twisted my shoulder from her grip. "We have to talk to him."

She pressed a button beside his bed. "You can't. You must leave now."

"You can't"-

"I will and I'm asking you to leave now." Her voice took on a steely quality as she supported the Professor through another coughing fit. "I will ask security to escort you out for Charles's best interests if you do not go."

Logan took my hand. "C'mon."

"Professor"-

" ** _You must find the Iron Lady._** "

" ** _What?_** "

" ** _The…Iron Lady._** "


	17. Chapter 17

"There's nothing," I said with a sigh, slouching in my chair. "All I can find is stuff about a film and a female British Prime Minister."

Logan and I were sat in an internet café in a nearby town after being escorted from the hospital by security guards. I'd told Logan what the Professor had said as we were leaving and we'd come to the first place that had internet. But it wasn't going too well.

"Are yeh sure he said the Iron Lady?" he asked, squinting at the computer screen.

"Yes." I frowned. "Could it be the Statue of Liberty?"

He shook his head. "Nah, s'made of copper."

"Call Ororo," I said. "She might know something."

Scrubbing his face with his hand then running through his hair, making it even wilder, he pulled out the mobile from his back pocket and dialed Ororo's number while I continued to search for the Iron Lady. Logan's first words to Ororo were that the Professor was alive and for the next minute or so, all I could hear was her shouting.

"Alright, calm down," said Logan, rolling his eyes at me. "We've only just found out…If yeh can get past Dr Moira MacTaggert…somethin' 'bout transferrin' conciseness…he wanted to tell us to find the Iron Lady…dunno. Rogue thought yeh might know..." He frowned, took the phone away from his ear and stared at it. Putting it back to his ear, he said, "Gotta go", and hung up, his shoulders tight. "C'mon, kid," he muttered, grabbing my hand and leading me out of the café.

"What's happening?" I demanded. "Where are we going?"

He said nothing, half dragging me down the street towards the car when suddenly he stopped and whirled, snarling. My jaw dropped as I saw Sabretooth, Mystique and John step out from an alleyway. Several people screamed.

"Whaddya want?" growled Logan.

"You know what we want," said Mystique, examining her nails. "Give us the girl and we'll leave you alone."

He snarled, pushing me behind him and extending his claws. "Yeh're gonna have to go through me first."

"Logan"-

Mystique laughed mirthlessly then fixed him with her amber eyes. "The faithful puppy dog routine is getting on my nerves, now."

"Run," Logan whispered out the corner of his mouth to me.

"No, I"-

" _Run_."

But it was too late.

John hurled a fireball in Logan's direction as Sabretooth charged. Mystique turned her gaze at me and grinned wickedly. Adrenaline surged through me and I spun round, driving my limbs to match the racing rhythm of my heart. The blazing heat of John's fire scorched the back of me as my feet pounded the pavement, joined by Mystique's. She latched on to my shoulder, shoving me roughly to the ground and knocking the wind out of me with a well-placed blow. I gasped and rolled as she tried to use her weight to hold me down.

"How’s that arm of yours?" she sneered, diving for my hands.

I yanked them up and slammed the heel of my palm under her chin, a crack sounding as her head whipped back. I scrambled to my feet only to have them knocked out from under me, Mystique having recovered and swung her leg round. I yelped, my wrists protesting at the jarring impact, and she rolled me on to my back, pinning my arms with her knees. I glimpsed Logan throttling Sabretooth while John flung fireballs at his back, his top nearly disintegrated.

I threw my hips up and Mystique, caught unawares, tumbled off and I managed to stand before she had recovered. I started running again. The only thought in my mind was run, run like Logan had told me.

Something collided with me and I was sent skidding along the ground. Mystique landed on me, gripping my shoulders and rolling me over. She pinned my arms and sat back on my thighs, rendering my legs useless.

"I'm going to give a little injection," she said, pulling a hypodermic needle from nowhere.

"I know what you want from me," I said, working my hand from her knee.

She stopped inspecting the needle and scowled. "And what is it?"

"You want to make a virus." I continued pulling my hand while trying to keep her attention. "And you need me for it." My hand was nearly free.

"Which means you're not getting away this time."

"That's not going to happen." My hand came free and I seized her wrist as she drove the needle down to my neck.

She was incredibly strong, the end of the needle growing closer and closer to my neck and I only had one hand. She wrapped her other one round the needle and forced it downwards. I was desperately trying to get my trapped hand free, wriggling and twisting it, the cold concrete seeping through my coat and adding to the iciness in the pit of my stomach. I couldn't get it free and the needle was getting closer and closer and I couldn't hear anything but the sound of my blood thrumming in my ears-

My hand slipped free. I punched her in the jaw, her head jerking back, and her grip on the needle slackened enough that I was able to thrust it away. But she didn't let go of it. She recovered quickly and came back even stronger than before, eyes full of anger and determination. I struggle to keep the needle away with both hands, muscles burning.

"Is Magneto planning to do what he wanted to do on the Statue of Liberty?" I gasped, gaze fixed on the tip of the needle.

She leaned closer, putting her weight behind the needle. "Even worse," she breathed. "A whole city full of mutants with no way of stopping the virus."

"How am I supposed to fit in?" The needle was so close I could practically feel the point pressing into my skin.

"I don't know." She grinned. "I'm just bringing you to him."

There was a deafening roar and Mystique was suddenly off me and I could breathe. But I barely had a chance to register that before an arm wrapped round my waist and I was being half-dragged, half-carried along the street towards the car.

"I though I told yeh to run," snarled Logan. Blood was smeared across his face and over the remains of his clothes.

"I tried," I wheezed.

Pounding feet sounded after us. I glanced over my shoulder to see Sabretooth running on all fours, Mystique and John bringing up the rear. I dug my heels harder into the ground in an attempt to go faster. I had no wish to be on the receiving end of any of them again.

Searing heat billowed round us. The smell of burning hair and clothes clogged my nose except there was no time to do anything as we reached the car. Logan didn't bother unlocking it. He just slashed the door off with his claws and practically threw me in, following me and hotwiring it in record time.

Sabretooth leapt onto the hood, his grotesquely long nails sinking into the metal like it was butter and keeping him on. Logan roared, stepped hard on the gas and yanked the wheel sharply to the left. It did nothing to get Sabretooth off.

"Get off the fuckin' car!" bellowed Logan, swerving to avoid oncoming traffic blaring their horns.

"If ya gimme the girl." Sabretooth crawled up the hood.

Logan snarled.

There was a resounding thump. I spun round in the seat and saw Mystique had landed on the boot, hanging on by the windscreen wipers, her face full of malice. She slammed a fist into the back window, shattering the glass and showering it everywhere. I screamed as she leapt into the car, landing on the back seats like a cat and lunging for me.

I ducked her hands then swiped for them, Logan preoccupied with Sabretooth who was nearly in the car as well. She evaded them and reached for my bare neck. I consciously made sure my skin was on as I swung a knife strike to her neck which collided with her and sent her reeling back. A heel strike to her nose gave me the chance to dive over the passenger seat.

She brought a knee to my kidneys and I almost failed to grasp the door handle I was aiming for. The door flew open and stirred up the glass, Mystique throwing herself to me to prevent herself from falling out. I threw my hips up to continue her momentum and she tumbled out of the car with a cry that was drowned out by howls from Logan and Sabretooth.

I rolled to find each had their claws buried each other. Grabbing a large shard of glass without thinking, I charged forwards and drove the point deep into Sabretooth's eye with a battle cry. He released Logan fell out the window, dropping off the car.

Logan seized the wheel just in time to avoid an oncoming truck. "Are yeh crazy?" he bellowed, flooring the gas.

"We were about to crash!" I retorted furiously, clambering into the front seat and brushing glass off my coat.

He growled, retracted his claws and turned on to the highway, the engine roaring. I sighed, trying to calm my racing heart and rapid breathing, and wondered just how many more times we'd have to fend off Magneto's thugs. And how many more times Logan was willing to protect me from them.


	18. Chapter 18

Logan found a motel in the middle of nowhere some time after the sun had disappeared over the horizon and the stars had begun their nightly illumination, freezing air rushing into the car since there was no driver's door, back window or front windscreen.

The guy at the reception desk raised his eyebrows at Logan's bloody and torn appearance as he handed him the keys though said nothing, his eyes raking over me. I ignored him, following Logan with chattering teeth to our room which was small and cheap.

Logan sank down on to the bed, his head in his hands and bag by his feet. He looked a mess, his shirt and wifebeater hanging on by mere threads, blood streaked and smeared over his face and chest, his hair completely wild. The only light were the moon's rays pouring into the room and casting him in shadow.

I dropped my bag by the door and headed into the bathroom to find something to clean him up with. I didn't particularly want to share a bed with him if it was going to get it filthy and I wanted to help him. Getting a washcloth and soaking it in warm water, I returned to where Logan was and gingerly wiped it across his bloodied forehead. He lifted his head and watched me with his hazel eyes as I gently cleaned his face, pushing his hair back and scrubbing his mutton-chops. It took a while to clean his neck, back and chest and by the time I'd finished, my gloves were bloody and soaked through.

I'd taken off my coat, shoes and socks and was kneeling in the bed behind him so I could do his back. As I cleaned the last of the blood, Logan shifted, kicked off his boots and socks and turned, propping himself up with the headboard and pulling me into his lap, my knees falling either side of his hips. His gaze was so intense, I lowered my eyes to my hands and watched as he reached out, removed the washcloth and slowly took off my gloves and scarf, tossing them to the floor as well to join his ruined tops.

He snagged a finger in one of my white streaks, echoing the past. My heart rate quickened, desire seeping into my stomach and chest but I pushed it down. I wanted this more than anything except he was doing nothing more than leading me on, his heart for someone else.

"Don't." I struggled to keep my emotions and skin in check, feeling exposed with no gloves. I clasped my hands to my stomach.

"Don't what?" he breathed, sitting up and cupping my face in his big, warm hands.

"Don't use me."

He stilled and frowned. "What do yeh mean?"

I swallowed, fighting desire and my skin. "I know you still love Jean. I had one of your dreams last night."

"Which one?"

"The one where ya pick up a hooker in a bar n' throw a bottle of whiskey at her cos she wasn't Jean." I cringed at my accent, wishing it didn't come out when I was angry or upset.

He growled. "Wasn't thinkin' of Jean," he whispered, moving so close I could taste his breath on my tongue, thoroughly intoxicating. "I was thinkin' 'bout yeh."

I nearly sobbed, wanting so desperately to believe him as he dragged his thumb across my cheek, nerve-endings lit alight at his touch. "Don't lie ter meh, Logan."

"I'm not." His eyes searched mine. "It's yeh I want."

Tears threatened to spill. "Don't"-

He put a finger to my lips, not a care for my skin as his eyes continued to search. Then, slowly removing the finger, he leaned forward and gently pressed his lips to mine. There was no movement, nothing except our lips pressed together, but it shattered something inside me. I sobbed into his mouth, the tears finally spilling over and I let the sensation of him wash over me; his warm lips against mine; the stubble scratching me; the sweet taste of him, a hint of cigar smoke mixed with _him_.

I pulled away and tried to get off his lap, knowing that he was looking for someone else, looking for Jean. It was bittersweet. But he grabbed my arms and held me fast.

“Logan,” I started, fighting his hold and trying not to let the dam completely burst. Everything, Magneto wanting me, the running, the fighting and the constant on edge with Logan was now overwhelming.

“No, Marie, listen to me”- He reached for my chin and forced it up.

I looked downwards, not wanting to see his face. How could he look so handsome yet so painful at the same time?

“Look at me.”

“No”- I jerked my chin away from him and made to move backwards.

He tried to get hold of me. “ _Marie_ ”-

Suddenly, his mouth was on mine again, this time scorching and so hungry and pure that it went straight through me, setting my body on fire. I whimpered, tears falling freely as desire, anger, lust and frustration flooded me. His hands slid down to my waist, he heat radiating through his clothes. My hands began wandering over his chest, reveling in the rough texture his chest hair on my palms. His tongue darted out of his mouth, skimmed my lips and I was gone, drunk on the taste of him. I was so lost in the feeling, drowning and spinning and wanting his everything that I failed to notice my skin switch on.

"Fuck." He pulled away, eyes closed and tension in his shoulders as he reigned himself in.

I stared at him before hurriedly leaping off the bed, horrified at myself. I recalled the time I’d kissed Bobby at his house, how I’d gotten lost in him, forgotten my skin and hurt him. Although I was angry and confused at Logan, I couldn’t hurt him. Not after all he’d done for me. My head was spinning from my whirlwind of emotions.

"Marie." A tender hand brushed the back of my neck.

I flinched, earning a low growl and he spun me round so I had no choice but to look at him.

He dragged a hand over my cheek and brushing the tears away. “I used ter but I don’t anymore.”

A ghost of his feelings trickled through my mind – wanting, desire, possessiveness – and the anger rushed out of me in a whoosh. “How long?” I breathed, scared this whole moment would fade before I got answers.

He shrugged. “Dunno. A while, I guess.”

I could barely see his face because of the shadows and it left me a little stranded, unable to see his expressions. “When did ya realize?”

He sighed, like he wasn’t sure he should be telling me. “Christmas,” he finally answered. “When I saw yeh in that dress.” There was a smile in his voice as his hands skimmed my shoulders.

“Why didn’t you say something?” I asked.

“I didn’t know.”

“Why now?”

“I thought Mystique had yeh and all I could think ‘bout was that yeh didn’t know.”

“And finely having some control of my skin probably helped,” I added darkly.

“Yeh skin has never scared me,” he said quietly.

I gasped, desire soaring at the words. 

He leant down so his face came out of the shadows and I saw how wide his pupils were. His lips danced over mine but the touch was short lived as my skin flared. He pulled away.

"Ah'm gonna hurt ya," I said, embarrassment heating my cheeks.

"Yeh not gonna hurt me."

"Ah am and ah don't wanna."

"Do yeh trust me?" He brushed a thumb over my lips.

I nodded.

"Then yeh not gonna hurt me."

"Logan"-

And I was drowning in him again, all sensible thought rushing south as he pushed me back towards the bed, his kiss a little more restrained this time. His hands were in my hair while mine gripped his shoulders to support myself, his lips making their way to my throat. It was as though the tender skin at the base of my throat, scratched by his stubble, was directly wired to my knees, making them weak, and I was grateful for the bed as I fell onto it. Logan kept his weight off me and moved his hands to the hem of my top, his fingers brushing the skin beneath. I whined, sliding a hand into his hair, and tugged him closer, rolling my hips instinctively to his. Desire rocketed through me as I felt the hard ridge in his jeans. He growled, his control fraying, and his fingers flexed under my top, the heat singeing my skin. Rolling us over, I braced my hands on his chest and rolled my hips again with a broken moan.

"Fuck, Marie," he ground out, his hips rising to meet mine and hands clenching my waist.

Lust seared through me at the sight of him spread out under me, something I'd only ever imagined in my deepest fantasies of being touchable. His eyes burned with a heat that set a fire raging through my stomach and concern for my skin went out the window. Pushing my hands up his torso and memorizing every dip and ripple of muscle, I pressed my lips to the pulse point in his neck, feeling it race at the contact as he worked his hands higher and higher under my top. He tasted sweet and salty and _Logan_.I nearly melted when his hands grazed the underside of my bra before sliding back down to my waist.

I whimpered, sinking my hips into his. "Take it off," I murmured, brushing his lips with mine.

"Take what off?"

"My top." I caught his lip and tugged. "Take it off."

Within seconds it was on the floor and I suddenly felt very self-conscious of the lacy green bra I'd picked out at Wal-Mart, having never had a boy see me in my bra, let alone someone I loved. But Logan didn't seem to mind as he traced the lines of my stomach and the valley of my breasts before pulling me down and devouring my lips with his.

"So fuckin' pretty," he growled between kisses. "So fuckin' beautiful now yeh're  _mine_."

I gasped at the infliction in his voice, finally understanding, as he tumbled us then groaned, his heavy weight settling on my fervent core. I pushed my hips up and Logan, who had started trailing kisses down my neck, grunted like it had been kicked out of him.

"M'rie," he groaned as I hooked my leg over his hip. "Oh, fuck…"

We were now grinding into each other with abandon, falling deeper and deeper, our tongues, teeth and lips harmonizing. Logan's hands slid round my back and found the strap of my bra.

"Please," I breathed into his ear, accentuating it with a particularly hard undulation of my hips. I was so completely and utterly drunk on him.

"M'rie, we gotta slow"-

" _Please_."

He groaned, fumbled for a moment before it came apart and he was cupping my shoulder blades in his hands. Then they were on my aching breasts and I thought I was going to explode. All the skin-on-hypersensitive-skin was dizzying but on skin that had never been touched by another person was mind-blowing.

I ran my hands up his chest, over his shoulders, down his back and along his abdomen, relishing in the hitches of his breath as I skimmed his ticklish spots. He growled and pulled my bra straps down my arms, taking it off. I drew back, unsure of what he would think of me.

Bracing himself above me on his elbows, his eyes, which were nearly swallowed by his pupils, took me in. His eyes, full of possessiveness, were enough to make my nipples harden and his answer was to press his hips slowly into mine.

He ducked his head and took a nipple in his mouth, swirling his tongue round and making me moan unashamedly. I threw my head back, digging my nails into his shoulders and hooking my other leg round him. He lavished my other breast with the same attention then pressed his lips to mine. I was wound tight like a spring and I needed to be released. But Logan was restraining himself.

"I want  _all of you_ ," I whispered.

He groaned, hiding his face in the crook of my neck. "I'll hurt yeh."

"You won't."

"M'rie."

"Do ya trust meh?"

He studied me for a moment, gold spinning in his eyes. "Mmm."

I raked my nails up his sides and it freed something wild inside him. He growled, the reverberations vibrating through me, and his kiss became hot and needy. He pulled me to him and braced his knees so our torsos were flush and his belt buckle bit at my stomach. Never had I ever had so much of my skin exposed and never so much of it touching someone else.

My chest wound tighter and tighter, the tension building higher and higher as we ground into each other, my skin blazing. I could feel Logan's heart racing in his chest, matching mine as we chased our release.

"C'mon," he rumbled, kneading a breast and pressing his teeth to the side of my neck.

A wave rocketed through me but I was still climbing, making my way to the precipice as the urgency become almost overwhelming. The lust and intensity coursed through me, doubling with each frantic thrust.

" _Come for me_."

I threw myself off, unable to control myself and was assaulted by a headlong rush filled with delirious sensation that was blindingly white. Suddenly, his hand was under the waistband of my jeans and pressing bare skin in time with his frenzied grinding. I threw my head back again, squeezing my eyes shut tight and urging him on with wordless moans.

Just as I thought I could feel nothing more, he plunged a finger into me and gave my desperate muscles something grip, drawing me out as he buried his face in my neck. My toes curled into the sheets and my fingers dug into the muscle of his back, lost in slippery skin sliding over slippery skin and Logan's guttural sounds growing louder and louder.

"Say yeh mine," he growled, thrusting harder and harder.

"Ah'm yours," I gasped. "Only yours."

His thrusts turned hard and primal, his hand vanishing from the front of my jeans. But it was no loss as he went over the edge and came with a strangled roar, muffled by my neck as his teeth sank into it. The pleasure-pain of it had waves coursing through me again and my hips bucked up. His claws popped out, a loud  _sknit_  in my ear, as he convulsed and the waves intensified, both by his touch and his claws. Supernovas bloomed behind my eyes.

As we came down from our high, Logan retracted his claws and rolled so I was sprawled on top of him, listening to the thud of his heart in my ear and feeling utterly exhausted.

He shifted beneath me. "I need to get outta these jeans, Marie," he said softly, running a hand through my hair.

I hurriedly climbed off him and watched him go to his bag, rummaging for his spare jeans. Then, to my shock, he pulled the ones he was wearing down in front of me and tossed them aside. At least his back was to me but it did mean I did saw his ass which was even more delectable than I'd imagined, all toned and proving that he did, in fact, not wear any underwear.

"Stop starin'," he said with a chuckle.

I dropped my gaze to my hands which were finally able to touch. Logan lifted up my chin and planted a chaste kiss on my swollen lips. Love rather than desire flooded through me and I let him pull me back on to his chest as he lay down.

"You okay without having a shirt on?" I asked, snuggling into him and fighting back a smile as I realised he was purring. “My skin”-

"It’s fine."

And, finally sated and comfortable with myself, I fell asleep, filled with warmth and contentment.


	19. Chapter 19

There were more than several layers of bliss clouding my mind as I slowly woke up, morning sunlight bleeding through my lids. I was half-sprawled over Logan's chest, an arm draped over his stomach, a cheek pressed to his chest and a leg hooked round his. I groaned and shifted, inhaling the familiar scent of sandalwood, cinnamon and cigar smoke as I opened my eyes to find Logan looking down at me. He smiled and planted a tender kiss on top of my head, pulling me completely onto his chest.

I shivered as his skin brushed against mine, tickling my bare nipples. I suddenly felt a little self-conscious at having my whole top-half exposed and, as I sat up, I brought an arm up to cover myself

"Don't," said Logan, grasping my wrist and pulling it down before wrapping his hands round my waist.

I lowered my hand. "Ah'm hungry," I said to cover my embarrassment, stomach growling.

"Worked you up an appetite?" he asked with a smirk.

I felt my cheeks burn and prodded him in the chest. "I bet you have as well."

He made a low noise in his chest. "Go n' get changed and we’ll get somethin' from nearby," he said, sitting up.

I leaned forward and brushed his lips with mine, loving the way his hands tightened on me. Then I hopped off the bed, swiped up my discarded clothes and bag, and headed into the bathroom. There was no use locking the door since Logan had seen half of me already.

I nearly slumped to the floor. Logan had kissed me! Okay, it went a little further than that but he kissed me like he would go to hell for it but it would be worth it.

As I showered, I couldn't stop grinning and I looked like a fool in the mirror. I dried my hair, fluffed it up and pulled on some clothes. I was suddenly conscious of what I should wear. Jeans and a shirt seemed too casual. But, then again, it had never been a problem before. And he'd liked my bra.

Deciding just to wear my usual jeans and top, I put on the scarf to hide the bruising bite mark on my neck so people wouldn’t stare, pulled on my gloves for security and headed back into the bedroom. Logan was still sprawled on the bed and he flashed me a pirate grin as I set my bags down by the door.

"What?" I asked.

"Nothin'," he said, standing and walking towards me. "Just…I can do this now."

Suddenly I was pressed up against the wall and his mouth was on mine, kissing me as though it was for the first time again. I moaned, the desire that had been simmering gently in my stomach flaring up, and I wrapped my legs round his hips, sending my desire rocketing.

Logan growled and pressed the already hard ridge of his jeans into my core. Whimpering, I slipped my hands into his hair and pulled him closer, never wanting him to leave. There was something in the back of my mind warning me I was going to lose him now that I had him. The thought, however, was obliterated when yanked my scarf aside and dragged his tongue across the bite on my neck as our stomachs growled in unison.

"Think we'd better stop if we want something to eat," I mumbled, dragging my lips along his jaw line.

He grunted and buried his face in the crook of my neck breathing hard. Then he pulled away but not before he'd softly kissed my forehead. "I'm gonna get a little sidetracked by you."

I chuckled. "Tell me about it." I unhooked my legs from round him and unwound my hands from his hair, scraping his nipple as I slid my hands down his chest. He growled. "Go and put some clothes on so we can get breakfast."

He kissed me quickly one more time before vanishing into the bathroom. The grinning like a fool was back as I sank onto the bed, my knees too weak to hold me. Logan was still kissing me! I was surprised I hadn't melted into a puddle of lust and ecstasy by the time he came out of the bathroom, the shirt he was wearing clinging in all the right places.

"You ready?" he asked, slinging both his and my bags over his shoulder and taking my hand like he'd done it a million times before.

I nodded, following him out of the room and to the lobby. The receptionist, who was the same one from last night, raised an eyebrow but, again, said nothing as we returned the keys. Then it was to the car to hunt for some breakfast.

"Where d'you want to go for breakfast?" asked Logan as he steered the  _very_  battered car out of the parking lot.

I shrugged. "Dunno. I want waffles if that helps. And a car repair shop wouldn't be such a bad idea."

He rolled his eyes. "And where am I gonna find those?"

I shrugged again. "You're the guy."

He found a roadway diner with a garage next to it. I ordered a plate of waffles for me and a huge country breakfast for Logan. He returned, sitting in the booth opposite me, digging into his breakfast like someone was about to take it away from him.

"What are we going to do today?" I asked, swallowing a mouthful of waffle doused in maple syrup.

"Dunno," he said round several pieces of bacon. "Thought I might call Ororo to see if she found anythin' else 'bout this whole thing."

"That'll take about five minutes," I pointed out. "I refuse to spend the rest of the day finding out who this 'Iron Lady' is."

"Thought we could drive west."

"That's as bad as spending the whole day researching. Any better ideas?"

He grinned at me. "Oh, yeah. I got better ideas."

I felt my cheeks flame. " _Logan_!"

"What?" He swallowed the rest of his egg. "What would you rather be doing?"

As usual, he had a point. "So"-

The diner exploded, literally. Glass rained down, people screamed, plates and cutlery fell to the floor. I instinctively ducked under the table, Logan hauling me to him and shielding me as more glass showered the place.

"What's"- I started, ears ringing.

He clamped a hand over my mouth, not a care that my skin could be on, and made a shushing gesture. I peeled his hand away, kneeled close to the floor and peered through the gap beneath the seat, adrenaline building up already. Two people appeared in the shattered doorway, one blue skinned, the other heavily booted. More people screamed, the sound cutting through the ringing.

Logan pulled me back and pointed under the opposite booth. "Crawl under it and get out the back way," he mouthed as footsteps crunched on the glass.

"But"- I begin, feeling my heart start pounding.

His glare had me slithering along the floor without question. The glass bit into my stomach as I heard him get to his feet and challenge Mystique and Sabretooth.

"Oh, for fuck's sake, Wolverine," said Mystique. "Since when have  _you_  cared about anyone? This is just getting annoying." There was a gunshot, making me jump. "Shut up!" she shouted at the whimpering patrons.

The following silence was deafening and it only made my heart race faster.

I slid out from under the booth and dove under the next booth, Logan's training on how to stay quiet kicking in.

"Well, it's gonna stay annoyin' till you leave her  _alone_ ," growled Logan, a  _skint_  following his words.

"Put 'em away, runt." Sabretooth sounded ready for a fight, a dare in his voice.

"Where's Rogue?" demanded Mystique.

I slid under the next booth, gritting my teeth as more shards of glass cut into my stomach and hands.

"She's here," snarled Sabretooth. "She stinks of him."

 _Stink_? Why would I- Oh…My cheeks blazed. I kept moving, though, trying to work out what to do when I reached the end of the row.

"Hand her over, Wolverine," said Mystique. " _NOW_!"

"You're gonna hafta go through me."

"Sh-sh-she's there," whispered someone from behind the bar.

I fixed my eyes on the traitor. It was a porky, pasty-faced, bald-headed idiot pointing at me with a shaky finger. I scowled at them, swearing under my breath.

"Get her."

There was no use hiding anymore. I scrambled to my feet and dove behind the bar as Sabretooth roared and Mystique screeched something at him. I skidded across the floor on my knees, throwing the bald headed guy one last glare. I was beyond fear. I was numb, filled with nothing but determination as my fight or flight instinct started. Magneto wasn't getting his hands on me without a fight.

Logan growled, a gun fired and Sabretooth leapt over the bar, landing several feet away from me. The patrons screamed, scattering like hunted rabbits, and Sabretooth grinned, his eyes landing on me, before advancing slowly. I could hear Mystique and Logan having it all out a few meters away.

I started sweeping my arm round behind me in search of something to throw at the damn guy whilst keeping my eyes locked firmly on him in case he did anything. His grin widened, a hand snaking out to me, and I kicked it away.

"Keep ya hands offa me," I warned, my hand closing round what felt like the handle of a pan.

Sabretooth chuckled. "Like that's gunna happen, girly."

Flinging whatever it was in my hand and glad Logan had worked on my aim, the frying pan hit its mark true, straight into his crotch, the sound of it colliding with him ringing out. His eyes bugged, he faltered and I bolted.

I bounded over the heads of several patrons and jumped up onto the bar, skipping over plates of pancakes and cups off coffee as I sprinted towards Logan who was still battling furiously with Mystique. The fear was back and it almost had me toppling off the counter.

" _Your gun_!" Mystique bellowed at Sabretooth. "Shoot the fucking girl!"

I threw myself off the bar, feeling something whiz past and miss me by a whisker. I landed heavily on my front, spun and picked up a knife that had fallen to the floor as I got back to my feet. Sabretooth was right behind me, his eyes wild.

"I'm gunna get yeh for that!" he snarled.

But he never reached me as Logan slammed into him and sent him careening away, Mystique's dart gun following after him. She fired more shots, all of them missing. Then she turned her attention on me.

"I've been wanting to get my hands on you, you little bitch," she said, moving towards me and aiming the gun at the centre of my chest. "They say that it's always third time lucky. This is the  _forth_  time and you are  _not_  getting away this time!"

"Doesn't Magneto realize the X-Men will beat him?" I asked over the sounds of sirens wailing and Logan and Sabretooth fighting, fumbling for time. "They have every other time."

She laughed and it chilled me to the bone. "He can't be beaten this time."

"Who's the Iron Lady?"  _More time, keep her talking…_

She laughed again. "Is that what your dear Professor called it? Such an old fashioned term for what will become the beacon of a new era."

"Of what?" I challenged, adjusting the knife in my hand. "A new era for mutants? A new era for your stupid Brotherhood?"

"A whole new era for humanity."

A gleam filled her eyes and I seized the chance of her distraction. Hurling the knife in her direction, I tore across the diner towards the door.

_RUN!_

That was the only thought in my mind.

I never got to the door.


	20. Chapter 20

I ached all over like I’d been hit by a bus. And, what with Logan’s memories, I knew exactly what that felt like. My eyes felt full of pins and my arm didn’t feel like it was part of me anymore. Groaning, I opened my eyes.

I was in an eight foot by eight foot cell, lying on a cold metal bed and staring up a cracked concrete ceiling. They’d got us.

“Marie?”

I groaned again and rolled onto my side to find Logan sat in the corner by the grated door, one long leg stretched out and the other bent with his arm resting on it. He was dressed in plain sweats, like me. Upon seeing I was awake, he rushed over.

“Yeh okay?” he asked, gently brushing a strand of hair from my face.

I nodded. “How long have ah bin out?”

“Dunno. I only woke up two hours ago.”

I started and winced as my head protested. “What the hell did they inject us with?”

“Ketamine and somethin’ else,” he answered with a scowl. “Gave _me_ enough to kill a fuckin’ elephant.”

I dropped my head back to the bed. “So much for keeping out of Magneto’s hands,” I muttered.

“It was my fault.” He dropped back on his haunches with a heavy sigh. “Again.”

“ _What_?” I sat up and ignored the wave of nausea. “Logan, no! None of this is your fault. What did I tell you after the fight on the island?”

His eyes met mine, pained. “That no one blames me.”

I got down on my knees in front of him. “Exactly. Ororo wouldn’t have gotten you to look after me if she didn’t think you were the best. You _are_ the best, Logan. It’s _my_ fault they”-

“No, Marie”-

I pressed a finger to his lips. “I made a mistake”-

“No”- he started, his warm breath washing over my finger.

I pressed it harder and ignored the warning glint in his expression. “I made a mistake and they got lucky.”

He pulled my hand away and suddenly his lips were on mine, ravenous and untamed as his hands drew me into him. My legs automatically slid to rest either side of his hips, my hands gripped the front of his shirt and every sensible thought rushed south. His hands roamed my body, leaving skin tingling for more.

“You,” he murmured, placing butterfly kisses along my jaw, “can never…make a…mistake.”

“Really?” I asked absently as his hands slipped under my sweat top.

He growled but it wasn’t a good growl and cut through my haze. He stood, shoving me behind him, and Mystique appeared on the other side of the grated door.

“Please don’t tell me you were just banging her, Wolverine,” she said in a disgusted tone. “I don’t think Magneto will be impressed if Rogue ends up pregnant.”

The thought of being pregnant with Logan’s baby had a thrill running through me.

“Fuck off,” snarled Logan, pulling me into his back.

I peered round him as Mystique chuckled. Logan growled.

“Oh, you really do like her.” She turned her attention to me. “Magneto wants to see you now. You can either come willingly and I won’t have to drug you or you can spend the next two days sleeping.” She produced a dart gun I recognized from the diner.

“If yeh take her, I’m comin’ as well.” Logan’s grip tightened on my arm.

Mystique’s eyes slowly focused back on him. “You are becoming a nuisance now, Wolverine.”

“Take me with yeh or yeh’ll hafta go through me.”

She rolled her eyes. “I guess it won’t be too hard to do you at the same time.”

“Do what?” he challenged.

“I’m sure Erik will let you know,” she answered.

Logan wouldn’t let her cuff me and held me against him as she led us along dimly lit, bleak concrete passageways. She looked almost gleeful, like everything she’d been planning was finally coming together.

I pressed my face into Logan’s side and inhaled deeply, savoring the scent of sandalwood, cinnamon and cigar smoke. If I could bottle this smell and breathe it whenever I felt down, I would be the most senile person in the world. Right now, it took my mind off what was happening and let me hide from what was about to happen.

She took us into a large hanger-style space filled with tubes and pipes and lots and lots of wiring. I felt Logan tense and growl low in his chest. I knew exactly what was going through his mind since the Logan in my head was having a fit, my thoughts filled with thoughts of Alkali Lake. I twisted my fingers into his shirt, both comforting him and me at the same time, and felt my heart stutter as he stopped walking. I looked up. 

“Welcome to the Eiffel Tower.” Mystique gestured to the hanger and my eyes caught sight of two metal slabs in the middle of the space, leather straps dangling down to the cold concrete floor. “Also known as the Iron Lady.” She grinned at me. “Like the implant Erik put in Xavier’s brain?”

My head was spinning. Why would Magneto take the time and effort to take everything to Europe? What was wrong with America? Had he changed his plans?

Logan’s gripped tightened to almost painful levels. “What are yeh plannin’?”

“I’m sure you’ll find out in due process but right now I want you both to lie down.” She pointed to the metal slabs, trotted to a wall and pressed on button on it. Six people dressed in white labcoats, two women and four men, entered the hanger via a steel door, marching towards us purposefully.

Logan held me in front of him and rested his forehead against mine, his eyes searching. I saw regret, burning anger and sorrow. But most of all I saw tenderness, protectiveness and something that made the gold flecks in his eyes melt into the green.

“I love you,” I blurted out, suddenly wishing I hadn’t said it as his eyes widened. 

He twirled my white streak round a finger and sighed, closing his eyes. For a moment, I thought he would push me away when he breathed, “I love you, Marie.”

“Oh, break it _up_ or I’m going to be sick!” Mystique grabbed the back of my sweats and yanked me out of his grasp before shoving me roughly in the direction of the slabs. “And don’t you think about doing anything stupid, Wolverine, because you’ve got twenty snipers trained on you right now.”

“And there’s me.” Magneto appeared in the doorway, his stupid cloak billowing behind him. 

Logan growled as I stumbled forward. One of the labcoats took my arm and led me to the slab. I numbly let them lie and tie me down.

“I presume the lovely Mystique has welcomed you,” said Magneto.

Twisting my head, I watched him stride into the space, his cape swishing. He looked confident and pleased with himself as though everything was going to plan.

“Whaddya want from us?” snarled Logan, starting forward.

Magneto flicked a wrist. Logan stopped like someone had pressed the pause button on a remote but it didn’t prevent the deafening snarl that erupted from him.

“No, Wolverine,” he chided, moving Logan to the other slab and laying him down on it. “You listen to me and do what I tell you.”

He growled again.

I strained against the straps pinning me down, testing the bindings, and watched with growing dread as the straps were tightened round Logan’s wrists, ankles and waist. The Logan in my head was panicking, reliving the memories of Alkali Lake.

“I believe the X-Men managed to deduce some of what I’ve been planning.” Magneto came and stood by me.

“Ya wanna make a virus usin’ me that’ll change people inta mutants,” I said, silently cursing my accent. “But what’s Logan gotta do with it and why Paris?”

“Logan will allow me to get all of what I want from you and Paris is the city of love,” he answered. “What an ironic thing that will be when the whole of it is filled with the thing humans despise the most.” His half-smirk was chilling.

“Ororo and Hank and Kurt and the rest of the team will find ya before alla that happens,” I said, glimpsing Logan struggling on the other slab.

“Oh, I doubt Charles’s dutiful little team of X-Men will find us here.” He chuckled. “We’re very well hidden.” Then, with a wave of his hand to the labcoats, he turned and strode away.

I hastily made sure my skin was off as the labcoats swarmed round me, their hands sheathed in latex gloves and clutching implements I could scarcely name. The one thing I could name was a frightening needle being lowered towards the crease in my elbow, the strap above it acting as the perfect tourniquet to draw blood.

Logan snarled as the needle pressed deep into the swollen vein and I winced, fighting to keep my mutation off. Whatever Magneto wanted, he was going to have a battle on his hands.

The labcoat ran off after getting one of their colleagues to press a cotton ball to my elbow whilst the rest took off the sweatshirt so I was left in only a bra on my top half for them to start sticking little white patches to my skin connected to thin wires winding off into the dim corners of the hanger.

Within moments the labcoat who had sprinted off with my blood returned and whispered something in his colleague’s ear then scowled at me as he called for Magneto.

“She doesn’t have a mutation,” he said to Magneto.


	21. Chapter 21

Magneto’s face would’ve been priceless if he hadn’t then fixed his cold blue eyes on me. “What do you mean she doesn’t have a mutation?” he demanded. “She nearly killed me with it!”

He marched into my line of sight and leant close so I could see each of his wrinkles and the cracks in his irises. He ignored Logan’s low growl as he peered at me like he was trying to see where my mutation had gone. Holding his gaze, I watched him frown then straighten and beckon for someone beyond my line of sight.

Logan’s deep, resounding growls had me on edge as I listened to the footsteps echoing on the concrete floor. To my horror, Sabretooth appeared before me, his mouth pulled into a twisted smirk as he reached out and gripped my chin, his filthy nails digging in. I made sure my skin was firmly off since a hit of him would be a complete nightmare.

He lowered his lips to my ear so all I could smell was wet dog. “Ya stink of the runt,” he said in a low voice, twisting my head sharply to one side. He chuckled at my resolute expression. “I’ll make sure ya stink of me by the time I’m done with ya.”

“ _Yeh keep yeh fuckin’ hands off her_!” bellowed Logan. The sound Magneto snapping his jaw shut was nauseating.

Sabretooth chuckled again, sinking his nails further into my skin, and it started to become a struggle to keep my skin off. Horrific thoughts and imaginings flickered across my mind and my stomach churned in protest at them as I saw myself under him, covered in blood and eyes glazed like I wasn’t seeing anything. I bit back bile and fought my skin.

“Sabretooth,” warned Magneto chiding voice. “You’re supposed to be doing what I asked.” He sounded like he was somewhere above me.

Sabretooth snarled in his direction then jerked his head for someone to come over. A labcoat stood beside him, holding a needle primed in front of him. I set my jaw and watched with wide-eyed trepidation as Sabretooth reached out again. Pulling away was useless since the slab prevented me from getting away and I struggled not to yelp, cheek smarting painfully as he dragged his nails down it.

Reflexively, I flicked my skin on and felt the labcoat ram the needle into the crease of my elbow. Logan was now growling incessantly.

Labcoat sprinted off with another syringe full of my blood. Sabretooth continued to hold me with his nails digging in.

“I suppose you really want to know what I’m planning,” said Magneto, suddenly drifting into my line of sight.

I yanked my chin out of Sabretooth’s grip, glaring at him, and shifted my gaze to Magneto. “Ya doin’ the same thing ya did on the Statue of Liberty,” I said with narrowed eyes, ignoring my stinging cheek that had my eyes watering.

He looked a little put-off at my blunt statement before composing and giving me a withering look. “No, my dear. I am going to do much better than that. I am going to use the ability of your mutation and Wolverine’s healing to create a virus. Your mutation will mean that the virus can adjust to every person’s DNA without fault and provide a suitable mutation and Wolverine’s healing will mean that the mutation stays fixed and won’t kill the person like it did with Senator Kelly.” He pursed his lips. “That was an unintended side-affect.”

“Ya _what_?” I exclaimed. “Ya do realize if ya get caught again, y’all never get out again.”

“A worthy price to pay for mutant rights,” he said with a sly smile. “That is, if they catch me.”

“Sir,” called a labcoat. “She’s has the mutation this time. The procedure is ready to be completed.”

Magneto’s grin resembled that of the Cheshire Cat, albeit it a very old Cheshire Cat, and I swallowed nervously, my bravado fading. How the hell was he going to get the virus that he wanted? Was it going to kill me in the process? Bile rose at the mere idea.

There was an ominous creaking and I swung my head round to see Logan rising from his slab, clearly trying to fight off Magneto’s control. He was brought closer and closer to me and trepidation spiked once again. Hurriedly making sure my skin was firmly off, I watched Logan’s arm be outstretched and pressed to my arm, his eyes filled with gut-wrenching sorrow.

“Sabretooth!” shouted Magneto, his voice resounding off the concrete walls. 

Suddenly, there was a thick, heavy hand round my neck. An obscenely hairy face hovered over mine, snarling and baring its teeth as the hand round my neck squeezed tight. The horrible sensation of not being able to draw air had my head spinning. My hands, pinned by my sides, were unable to move Sabretooth’s fingers away and the gasping was failing to work.

Logan snarled but could do nothing as my world turned hazy. I was struggling to keep my skin off, wanting to turn it on so I could breathe but not wanting to hurt Logan. He didn’t deserve-

I felt the switch go. Images, voices, feelings and thoughts raced through my mind, jostling for somewhere to go and jamming themselves to the inside of my mind and blocking what I could see it was so fast. To my relief, I could breathe though it came with the cost of having two ferals that hated each other crammed into my head.

“SHUT UP!” I roared, slamming my skin on and attempting to shove the thoughts into a box for me to organize later.

“My dear, that is not something I should be hearing from someone like you,” chided Magneto, somewhere behind me, moving Logan’s arm from mine to my stomach. “Sabretooth.”

Sabretooth, who had vanished, reappeared and he slapped my smarting cheek. I bit my tongue to distract myself both from the pain and to concentrate on keeping my skin off. My skin was starting to turn clammy. I needed to rearrange my head before the next onslaught of foreign experiences came.

“Again!” barked Magneto in the distance.

Logan’s eyes went wide and filled with blazing anger as Sabretooth sunk his claws into my neck. It was like he’d just rammed five white-hot pokers there. Instinctively, I opened my skin up to get him off and felt the tidal wave burst through, such a commotion it was a whir of color.

“Ya Anna Marie D’Ancanto but everyone calls ya Rogue,” I muttered to myself as I flicked my skin off once more and blocked the alien thoughts, all wanting attention. “Ya twenty and ya have toxic skin.” It was a trick the Professor had taught me once. “Anna Marie D’Ancanto”-

“Sabretooth!” Magneto’s voice, even through my haze, was starting to sound strained.

I was at my limit and for the briefest of moments my eyes cleared and I was able to see Sabretooth as he threw me a malicious grin. I barely saw him move as he raked his claws down the entirety of my side, from under my arm to the bottom of my hip.

Pain, deeper and more intense than the bullet-wound, the break in my arm, the Statue of Liberty, blazed through, burning like wildfire. My mind was overloaded. I couldn’t think expect to chant _Marie, Marie, Marie_ silently.

An unearthly wail filled my ears. Was that me? Or was it Marie? Or the runt’s mate?

_It hurts so  bad…_

It was me-

No, it had to be Marie because she was the one bein’ tortured and the bastard was to blame. I was gonna get him-

Her face was the perfect picture of pain, her base scent filled with it and I wanted to fuck her.

_Having adamantium fused to my skeleton didn’t burn like this…_

_Ya Marie_ , I thought, clambering through the clamor.

But if yeh Marie, then why can you remember runnin’ through the Canadian woods, naked and bloody?

Because I touched Logan, remember? When he stabbed me by accident.

I was havin’ a nightmare-

Ya wanted ter see what she looked like skewered-

I’m gonna get yeh, furball-!

_The fire is burning, burning…_

LET ME THINK! I can’t think… Building a quick cage round myself, I wonder why Logan’s healing factor isn’t muting the effects of my skin, helping me organize the influx of unfamiliar memories.

Something crashes, shattering my fragile cage and the images swarm in.

I’m watchin’ the runt’s face shrink as I fall from the Statue-

I’m lookin’ down at Marie’s face as we sit on the train and I see the trust in her eyes-

 _Anna Marie D’Ancanto, twenty years old, known as Rogue to her friends and has toxic skin_ …

It’s so heavy, pulling me down and down and down…The blackness is coming and it’s hard to fight but I want to go with it. If I let it come, will the pain go? Free from pain seems like a good idea but that sounds like death. I don’t want death. If I fight long enough, maybe Logan’s healing might help me…

 

All I want is some help…

 

I keep fighting but the blackness comes.

 

In the darkness, I still burn, lost and tumbling and burning…burning…


	22. Chapter 22

Living in a mansion filled with mutant kids can get a little daunting but you grow used to it after a while. As a sixteen-year-old girl, it was a bit of a learning curve, the constant talking, the patter of feet, the shouts of protest, the smells, the pervading sense of never being truly alone. By twenty, it was almost therapeutic.

However, at the present moment, it was thoroughly overwhelming.

I came round feeling as though my sense were being constantly bombarded. A strong metallic and bleach stench burnt my nostrils, overpowering any other scent. The humming of fluorescent lights was way worse than an irritating fly, the unrelenting beep of a monitor grated on my tender nerves, the steady drip of water drilled into the base of my skull and the muted thump of a hundred or so feet gallivanting above me added to the raw thrum in my head.

Gingerly opening my eyes, I immediately wished I hadn’t as lights assaulted them and I squeezed them shut to stop the brightness spearing the back of my eyes. Over the pain, I was surprised to find my head relatively clear, filled with only my thoughts passing through the dull ache, despite the memory of being completely inundated by others. 

“Fuck,” I muttered, edging my eyes open again to find myself on one of the beds in the med bay.

“I do believe that is rather crude language to be coming out of your mouth, Rogue.”

I started at the voice near me and whipped my head round with a growl to find the Professor in his wheelchair beside me, dressed in his customary three-piece suit and tie. The sound of a steady beating of a heart registered as I reined back the Logan in my head. To my relief, the sounds and the smells faded slightly as well.

“Sorry,” I said hoarsely, my throat like sand paper.

I scrubbed a hand over my face with a sigh. A cannula was in the back of it, piercing the black silk of a glove while a heart monitor was clipped to the index finger of my other hand. Dressed in a long-sleeve turtleneck, sweatpants and socks, I immediately realized my skin was live.

 _Great_ …

“I understand.” The Professor smiled gently. He looked more like the Professor I recalled before Jean ‘killed’ him but some of the previous person’s features were still noticeable. “How do you feel?”

“Like I’ve hit the ground at a hundred miles an hour,” I answered, cautiously sitting up. A wave of nausea passed for a moment but I fought it down.

“And your head”

“Well, there’s no Sabretooth rampaging around in it.”

“That’s good to hear. I collected him up and have put him behind the strongest block I can put up at the moment which I’ll reinforce at a later date.” He paused. “I wasn’t sure whether you wanted Logan’s new memories to be barricaded as well so I’ve put up a temporary wall since it appears you haven’t put up your strongest wall with his other memories.” There was a knowing glint in his eyes.

I felt my cheeks burn at that. My teenage crush had made me put up a flimsy wall he could easily push through to know he was always there and it’d grown to be a part of me. “Is he okay?” I asked to avert the Professor away from that.

“Logan is fine,” he replied. “He woke up three days ago. You’ve been comatose for a week.”

Unsure of if I needed to know what happened at the Eiffel Tower for him not to be in the chair at the foot of my bed, I tugged uneasily at a loose thread on my top. The Professor, a great man in every respect, annoyingly read my mind.

“I sent the Junior and Senior Teams to the Eiffel Tower as soon as Miss Munroe had me transferred back to the Mansion and they arrived there before Er-Magneto was able to get your blood to the modified virus,” he said in his smooth, calming tones. “By the time they reached you, you were suffering the side effects of three simultaneous personalities, blood loss and adjusting to the healing factors of both Logan and Sabretooth. Your body was unable to manage with permanently absorbing them and using them at the same time and, because Magneto kept Logan in direct contact with your skin, your mutation continued to absorb him.”

“What’s happened to Magneto and that lot?”

“Mystique vanished upon the teams’ arrival while Magneto and Sabretooth are in solitary confinement under the strictest security measures.”

“Magneto escaped last time,” I pointed out.

“Extra precautions have been taken to ensure he remains where he belongs.” There was a hint of sadness in his tones, a sorrow of seeing an old friend behind bars, so to speak.  

I sighed, running a hand over the stifling silk of the gloves. “I guess the whole thing means I can’t control my skin anymore,” I said heavily.

The Professor reached out and stilled my hand restlessly pulling at a glove. “I’ll help you regain the control of your skin.” His voice instantly quashed my fears I would never touch Logan again. “As soon as you’re ready to do so, I will have Miss Munroe assist me in helping you. Your mental abilities are incredible considering you have no telepathic or telekinetic abilities and I’m sure you can use them again.”

I smiled. “Thank you, Professor.”

He returned the smile as he said, “I’ll call Dr McCoy to give you a check-up so you can leave the medical bay.” He began moving away from the bed then stopped and turned his chair back round. “Logan is a little…tense at the moment,” he added carefully. He said no more, leaving the med bay and leaving me perplexed.

I barely had a chance to process his words fully before Hank trotted in, glasses perched on his nose and his eyes business-like behind them. He swiftly removed the cannula, checked my breathing, my head and my heart, and made sure no side effects were still persisting. I tried to ask him the questions burning on my tongue but he stopped me each time. I seized my chance when he stepped back to give me a quick once-over.

“Where’s Logan?” I asked him.

Hank glanced at the doorway, most likely cursing the Professor for leaving him to deal with the questions. “He is with Ororo, Kurt and Peter, collecting a group of mutant children in Louisiana,” he answered. “The failure of the cure is wreaking havoc across the country.”

I frowned, even more flummoxed. Logan had spent the night in the med bay when I broke my arm but he wouldn’t stay when I was recovering from Magneto’s handiwork? Distractedly thanking Hank and barely hearing his warnings of taking things slowly, I walked as quickly as I could up to the main floors of the Mansion. So unfocused, I walked into Jubilee on the main staircase as I headed to my room.

“Oh my, _God_!” she squealed, throwing her arms round me in a bear-hug and squeezing tight enough I struggled to breathe for a few seconds. “You’re okay. You’re okay!” She frowned at me. “Tell me you’re okay, chica.”

“I’m fine,” I assured her. “Is”-

“Thank God!” She did a little jig. “Because you looked so bad when we got to the Eiffel Tower, all cut up and bloody and…ghh. It was kinda gross.” She pulled a face. “You still don’t look very happy considering you were practically _dead_.”

As much as I wanted to talk to her, I wanted to freshen up before Logan got back. “Look”-

“I know what’ll fix you – a shopping trip! You could so get Logan to pay since he hasn’t gotten anything in ages. Mind you,” she said with a thoughtfully confused expression, “Logan’s been pretty grouchy. He was kinda distracted in training today before he and Peter were called.” Her pensive look continued.

Logan was grumpy? “Wh”-

“I’ve gotta go, chica, cos Kitty has a date with Bobby and _I_ have to chose what she’s wearing.” She rolled her eyes dramatically. “I don’t see what she sees in him. He’s such a jerk. Anyway,” she said with a grin, “I’ll see you at dinner in twenty, yeah?”

She dashed off towards the TV room without waiting for an answer, presumably to get Kitty. I continued up the stairs and along the corridors to my room. Its unchanged state was at odds to the events of the past few days, the shift in my point of view not reflected in the familiar mess of clothes, magazines, make-up, books and homework everywhere. For a moment, I wondered what it would look like caught up in the depths of my relationship with Logan.

I immediately shoved the thoughts aside, locking the door and heading into the bathroom. Why wasn’t Logan in the med bay? Had the Professor forced him to go to Louisiana with the others? I doubted it. The Professor wasn’t that kind of person and his comment about Logan implied he had some clue as to our relationship.

Stripping, cursing my skin and stepping under the steaming spray, I closed my eyes and sighed.

Relationship…

Logan had told me, before I was tied down to the cold metal slab, he loved me and I’d believed him, completely and utterly. Now, I was questioning his words, despite the sincerity of them. Had he simply said them because I’d said it to him and he knew it was what I wanted to hear? That I was possibly about to die and having the illusion my feelings were reciprocated would be some sort of comfort?

I shook my head. The almost-sex in the motel room had felt _very_ real. His words telling me he didn’t want Jean, his words saying he wanted me had been filled with sincerity as well. His eyes were almost black when he told me he realised he had feelings for me at Christmas upon seeing me in the red dress. Maybe he’d realised he actually still loved Jean and I was nothing more than a replacement. 

Groaning, I turned and rested my head against the cool tiles. Why did he have to be so laconic and impassive? Was he scared my skin had come back on?

No, that was wrong. He held absolutely no fear of my skin. So why…? I could look into his memories. There was no way of him hiding and they were recent enough to be able to explain his lack of presence.

I shook my head again, ramming the thoughts aside. The Logan in my head would fight me and I’d sworn to the real Logan I wouldn’t look. Not even my questions about us were justifiable enough to break the promise.

Why did this have to be so complicated? It was just a case of finding Logan and asking him straight.

Wasn’t it?


	23. Chapter 23

Logan avoided me like the plague.

Literally.

There was a pervading sense of him exiting a room before I entered it, backed up by condensation rings left on tables, vacant dips in the sofas, traces of cigar smoke. He never seemed to be in his room. If I found him in the Danger Room, he had the setting too high for me to enter without being decapitated or exploded into smithereens and no matter how long I waited outside, he never came out while I was there.

If I managed to end up being in the same room or corridor as him, he still managed to stay away from me, putting people between him and me, darting through a doorway, muttering excuses he had to be somewhere else.

I struggled most mornings when I woke up to deal with the onslaught of the healing factor, the sounds and the smells and the tastes overwhelming until the Logan in my head quashed them. My senses were definitely heightened but not to the extent of first thing in the morning. For a couple of days after waking from my coma I was disorientated, hearing noises from other rooms and thinking it was happening next to me, smelling things I couldn’t smell before like traces of people’s soap when they were stood several feet away and what the previous night’s meal was, and tasting things both in the air and in food. There was no Logan to help me and set me on the correct path so I bumbled along, trying to block most of it out and developing splitting headaches in doing so.

My lessons with Ororo and the Professor distracted me somewhat from Logan’s behavior. I was surprised to find it was easier to regain control, the process taking no more than a few sessions until I was able to touch both for at least ten seconds without fearing I’d suck them in. The Professor enforced certain mental barriers while Ororo repeated the relaxation exercises. I dreaded to think how I would cope with their mutations.

But it wasn’t enough to _fully_ distract me…

“Chica, you’re looking like someone’s kicked a kitten in front of you,” commented Jubilee as we sat in the library one evening nearly two weeks after everything. My homework was sprawled across the table.

Shit. “It’s nothing,” I told her, flicking through a textbook to find a quote I needed for my essay due in two days time.

She gave me a withering look. “It’s the face you had when you hit rough patches with Bobby and when Logan’s being irritating. So something’s up.”

Double shit. “It’s fine”-

“Don’t lie to me.” Her eyes were flinty.

Shit, shit, double shit. If I explained what was going on, she’d tell the whole school. “Please leave”-

“This has to be about Logan cos you don’t have anything to do with Bobby anymore.”

I stopped flicking through the textbook. Since when was Jubilee a detective? “Why does it matter to you?”

“It matters to me cos you’re being grumpy about everything,” she said shortly. “You won’t come shopping with me, you won’t talk to me, you won’t hang out and you keep asking me where Logan is.” She fixed me with a narrow-eyed glare. “What the fuck has happened?”

Sighing, I put down my pen. “In all honesty, I don’t actually know what’s happened. All I do know is that Logan keeps on avoiding me.”

Jubilee leant forward, obviously intrigued. “Have you had an argument?”

“No.”

“Did you annoy him when he was looking after you?”

“No.”

“Have you said something that might annoy him?”

“No.”

She sat back. “Well, go and talk to him then, chica.”

“I would, if he’d stay still for long enough,” I snapped.

“Jeez!” Scowling at me, she folded her arms and tipped her chair back. “He’s in his room at the moment.”

I raised an eyebrow. “And you know that how?”

“He was in the Danger Room for twenty-four hours straight and I saw the Professor kick him out,” she answered smugly.

“If I go to his room, he’ll kick _me_ out.”

“There’s no harm in trying.”

“Jubilee”-

“ _Go_. I’m sick of having to deal with you being grumpy.”

 -:-:- 

I ended up being stood outside Logan’s room.

The door was firmly shut and no matter how hard I listened (the Logan in my head wasn’t being cooperative), I couldn’t hear if he was really in there. The whole walk from the library to here was spent convincing myself a talk would be sufficient to answer my questions. Now, stood and staring at the wood of the door, I wasn’t sure. However, the Logan in my head was telling me I should go in. So, raising a gloved hand and knocking gingerly three times, I let myself in.

“Logan?” I called tentatively as I peered round the door and into the dimness.

He was sprawled on the bed, a beer in one hand and a cigar in his mouth, and I was sorely reminded of the time after the fight on the island and I’d come to make sure he wasn’t moping. Dressed in his typical lumberjack shirt tucked into his jeans held up by his Indian buckled belt with his feet bare, it was almost comforting to see there was still something familiar to him.

He looked up at the sound of the door closing, his eyes raking over me and taking in my clothes – a green scarf, v-necked t-shirt, the black opera-length gloves I woke up with, jeans and socks since I hadn’t been outside today. His expression was inscrutable as he did so and I felt as though he was seeing right through me. Jaw jumping, shoulders tensed and hand tight on his beer bottle, Logan looked like a cornered animal.

And I was the predator.

“Whaddya want, kid?” he asked in a low voice, setting the beer bottle on the bedside table and watching me with guarded eyes.

 _Kid_? I stared at him, shocked at his hostile demeanor. “Where were you?”

He narrowed his eyes. “Busy.”

Whatever I’d been expecting, it wasn’t _this_. “Logan”-

“I want yeh ter get out.” His voice was threatening low.

The bottom of my stomach dropped out and I felt sick as I stared at him. He’d _never, ever_ asked me to leave his room. “What?” I choked out.

“Yeh know where the door is.” He took a deep drag of his cigar. “Get out.”

“What the _fuck_ , Logan?” Anger surged through me at his inexplicable behavior. “Wh”-

“I said out!” He stood, stubbing his cigar out on his hand. He appeared to welcome the pain, the distraction, while the sound of sizzling flesh set my teeth on edge.

I gaped at him, free-falling with no clues as to which way was up or down. “Logan, wh-how,” I spluttered, struggling to make sense of what he was telling me and wishing I hadn’t listened to Jubilee.

“Just get _out_ , Marie.”

“Logan”- This had to be a nightmare…

“I don’t wanna know, kid.” He threw me an unreadable glare. “Chuck said I should give yeh some space and”-

“Ya just gonna listen to ‘im?” I challenged furiously, the anger rising thick and fast in my throat. “Ah was kinda hopin’ to see ya when ah woke up and Hank tells meh you’re in fuckin’ Louisiana! When the fuck have ya ever listen to anyone in ya life?”

“It was fer the best cos whatever fairytale plan yeh’ve got in yeh head ain’t gonna happen,” he snarled, his face dark.

Everything I’d pieced together and used to ground myself was being stripped away, leaving me spinning. “What fairytale plan, Logan?” I demanded, wishing my accent wasn’t so strong with my anger and grievance. “All ah wanted was you! And ya shovin’ meh away!”

He was fighting to keep his claws in. “I want yeh out now!”

“And what? Ya just expect meh to carry on like nothin’ happened between us?” I stepped forward, invading his personal space, and liked, in a twisted way, his eyes flashing at the intrusion. “You’re the only one who touches meh without bein’ scared and that does alotta things to a gal’s head!” Then it came crashing down like a ton of bricks. “You’re still in love with Jean, aren’t ya?”

His eyes softened, his shoulders dropped and he reached out for me. “Marie”-

Bile welled up inside me. A huge black wave that I hadn’t realised I’d been repressing soared up like a freak wave in a storm and crashed to shore, flooding me with a rage I couldn’t control. “Don’t lie to meh, Logan!” I screamed. “Ya still in love with her and ya thought it would be okay to kiss meh and touch meh?”

His expression was that of an animal that shouldn’t be goaded. “Don’t yeh dare”-

“‘Don’t ah dare’, _what_? Ya said ya didn’t want her! Ya told meh and ah believed ya!” The anger was so powerful, I wanted him to hurt like I was, to be as betrayed I felt. So I raised a hand and slapped him hard across the cheek, the sound ringing through the room.

Something shifted in him. “ _Yeh wanna know why I didn’t come ter the med bay_?” he roared, herding me backwards. “Yeh think I’m still in love with Jeannie? Huh?” His eyes flashed again. “Is that what yeh really think? _Tell me_!”

“ _Like hell ah want ter_!” I barely noticed my hand smarting from his adamantium cheekbone.

His claws slid out and I was stumbling, tripping over my own feet as he rushed towards me, his rage a tangible wall of heat. “ANSWER ME!”

“NO!”

“Is that what yeh _seriously think_?”

I hit the wall beside the door, wishing I’d never pushed him and tried to remember to breathe and all I could do was watch him charge at me and taking in his face that was twisted into a furious snarl.

“YEH REALLY WANNA KNOW?” His claws pinned me to the wall, ground deep into the walls either side of my shoulders, and he loomed so close I could see each hair on his cheeks and feel the heat of his anger radiating through his clothes as he pressed his body to me. “HUH?”

Suddenly, his mouth was on mine, teeth biting, stubble scraping, lips pulling, and he pressed himself hard against me. He wasn’t simply kissing me. He was bruising me, marking me. Breaking me.

He retracted his claws and gripped the back of my neck in his huge, warm hands, tilting me up to his devouring mouth as the pressure of his body changed from hemming me in to impatient and wanting.

“Fuck, Marie,” he muttered, pulling away and dropping his hands to my shoulders, eyes shut.

I’d completely forgotten my skin in the heat of the moment and, upon that realization, the sensations of him poured into my head; the desire, the passion, the possessiveness, the shame, the self-loathing.

“Sorry,” I whispered, looking downwards.

“Don’t be.” He touched the bottom of my chin so I looked up to see his eyes were dark and intense. “Yeh skin don’t scare me, darlin’.”

 _Darlin’…_ “Then why-?”

“Cos I hurt yeh.” His voice was haunted. “I couldn’t look after yeh and yeh deserve better than that.”

“Don’t tell meh that ah don’t deserve ya, Logan,” I whispered, feeling his mutton chops prickle through my gloves, “cos ah love ya and that ain’t chagin’ any time soon. Ya would never hurt meh.”

He briefly rested his forehead against mine, breathing hard. “I love yeh, Marie.” Then, as though I’d wrenched it from him, “ _Don’t ever leave me like that_.” 

“Ah’m sorry,” I repeated in a raspy whisper. “Ah tried. Ah tried not ter let it get too much but”-

“I know,” he said in a distressed voice as he brushed a hand over my cheek, light enough not to activate my mutation. “I couldn’t do anythin’ and- I was watchin’ my hand touch yeh and I couldn’t pull it away and I knew it was hurtin’ yeh.” His voice cracked. “I swore I’d look after yeh but I was the one hurtin’ yeh.”

“It was Magneto doing it all,” I said softly, brushing his hair from his forehead, glad to have recovered control of my voice now that I had my emotions in check. “You would never hurt me, Logan. You had no control over what was happening. I was the one that hurt you.”

At that, he growled. “You didn’t hurt me.” His eyes suddenly cleared and focused on me with such intensity I thought my hair would light on fire. “Magneto was the one hurtin’ me and I was the one hurtin’ yeh. And now yeh’ve got all my shit in yeh head cos of it.”

“It’s all locked away and I’m never looking unless you want me to,” I promised. “It can’t hurt me.” I smiled softly. “ _You_ can’t hurt me.”

“Marie”-

Throwing aside my new fears for my skin, I crushed my lips to his to halt his blame train, He groaned.

“This isn’t your fault,” I told him when the buzz of my skin forced us apart. “I couldn’t control my skin with the pain and Magneto made sure I stayed hurt. There is nothing involving you.”

Logan’s eyes narrowed.

“You always put yourself to blame whenever something happens. You’ve got to _stop_ because you’re the only one blaming you.”

He dropped his head to my neck and inhaled, the rush of air into his lungs cool on my neck before pulling away as my skin started up. I groaned.

“What?” asked Logan absently, side-tracked with planting kisses on my jaw line.

“It’s just that I’d hoped everything would be fine once Magneto was caught again but I can’t control my skin,” I replied, lifting my chin up so he could reach my throat properly.

He lifted his head and looked at me straight in the eye. “Yeh can control yeh skin, Marie.”

“I’ve been trying but I can’t go any longer than twenty seconds.” I dropped my gaze down in embarrassment.

“I know.” He brushed his lips across my forehead. “‘Ro kept tellin’ me I had to go to yeh sessions cos you couldn’t get past that but I wouldn’t go.”

“Did the Professor really tell you to stay away from me?”

“He did ‘fore he was certain Sabretooth wasn’t gonna come out.” He sighed, his breath rushing past my ear in a warm wave. “I guess I kept stayin’ away cos I thought it was fer the best.”

“Oh, Logan,” I sighed, letting my accent thicken my voice as I raised a hand to trace his lips. His eyes flickered. “You’re a jackass.”

“I know,” he murmured under my fingers.

The heat of his mouth bled through the silk of the glove and he tipped his head forward to capture one of my fingers. He watched me intently, nipping it gently, and I moaned.  

That was all it took.


	24. Chapter 24

It was a mad flurry of hands and lips as Logan pressed me hard against the wall, mouth claiming mine with almost the same ferocity as earlier while his hands roamed all over. Desire, heady and hot, surged through me and a growl rumbled deep in his chest as he pulled back to reset my mutation before diving down to lavish my neck with sucking bites.

“Logan,” I gasped brokenly, feeling echoes of his desire and lust mingling with mine to make my blood hum and trying to push away the fear threatening to suck him in. “Logan, my skin”-

He growled again. “I’m not scared, Marie,” he said between kisses, his teeth extremely distracting. “How many times do I have ter tell yeh?”

“Ah can’t”- My head was spinning so fast there was no way I could even find a sliver of control. “Ah’m gonna”-

“Yeh can’t hurt me, Marie.” His voice was rough in my ear and it sent shivers racing down my spine. “I’ll heal.”

I was torn; let Logan touch me and risk him being hurt once more by my skin or keep him at arm’s length until I could completely control it. “Let”-

He suddenly stepped back and my knees struggled to hold me as I slid back down to the floor. Yanking his shirt and wifebeater off in one move and dropping them to the floor, he raked a hand through his hair and let his intense gaze settle on me. Desire flooded me as I took in his rounded shoulders, chiseled chest and washboard stomach, allowing myself to follow the dark trail of hair from his belly-button to the low-slung waistband of his jeans with my eyes. The deep grooves of his hips were in stark relief by the shard of moonlight streaming through the gap in the curtains. My brain wasn’t functioning, lifting a hand to trace the trail.

I abruptly came to and shrank back before my hand touched him. He growled, seizing my wrist and holding it to his stomach. Then, to my horror and fascination, he pulled my glove off, tossing it to the floor to join his shirt and wifebeater.

“Logan!” I exclaimed, clutching my hand to me.

“Yeh not gonna hurt me,” he said in a low voice, stepping forward so I was hemmed in again. “Say it.”

I watched him reach out and unwrap the scarf from my neck, removing another of my security blankets. He dropped it to the floor as well.

“Say it,” he reiterated, moving even closer and skimming a finger along an exposed collarbone.

I whined, a wake of sparks left from his touch burning my skin. Desire and longing combined with fear was forming a giddy mix and my mouth had ceased functioning like my brain.

“C’mon,” he urged, dipping his fingers under the collar of my top. “Say it. _Tell me_.”

“Ah’m not gonna hurt ya,” I breathed, enthralled by all his exposed flesh. Despite having suffered the worst effects of my mutation, Logan was still the only one willing to put himself fully at risk without a second thought. Arousal had my cheeks warming at this implicit sign of his trust.

“Trust me,” he whispered, leaning down to press his lips to my ear. “Yeh won’t hurt me.” He took my other hand and stripped it of its glove.

“Ah won’t hurt ya,” I repeated, hesitantly running a hand over his bare arm. Skin-to-skin contact on my hands again was like breathing fresh air after years of enduring smog.

In that moment, I saw it all; his love for me, the possessiveness of his feral side; the desire, lust and arousal thick in his eyes; the wanting for comfort and consistency; the reason for his outburst earlier, fear not of my skin but of my possible rejection of him after everything.

“ _Lo-gan_.” My eyes fluttered closed.

He growled as he gripped the hem of my top, tugging it up. I was shocked to see his pupils were blown as they raked over the bared flesh of my pale stomach when I opened my eyes. I was also hard done by not to run my hands over his chest which was at eye-level, clenching them at my sides to prevent myself from hurting him.

“Yeh can touch me.” He pulled my top off me and tossed it aside.

I swallowed. “Ah can’t,” I said, hating the way my voice cracked on the last word. “My skin is poison.”

“Yeh skin can never be poison.” He stepped so close there was barely a hair’s breadth between us and I could feel my skin straining for the touch, for his life’s essence no matter how hard I tried to rein it back. “Yeh beautiful.”

At those words, my desire for him rose. And, to my delight and horror, he trailed a finger up my stomach and through the valley of my breasts to my collarbone, lifting away as my skin started to buzz and immediately returning.

I watched, fascinated at the contact and terrified he’d mis-time the buzz.

“Logan…” I breathed, stepping back.

He followed, pinning me to the wall with no contact whatsoever. His eyes were like a physical touch as they roamed over me, down my neck, the curve of my chest, the line of my stomach, past my hips before coming back to my eyes.

They were hungrier than I’d ever seen them.

There was no warning as he reached round me, unhooked my bra and tugged it off. He then cupped my breast in his hand and kneaded it for a moment, the feeling sending wildfire rocketing through me. I whined, letting my head fall back, and was lost when he moved away.

“Watch me.” His growled command drove me to look at him. “Let me show yeh that yeh can touch.”

I gasped as he flicked a thumb across my nipple which turned to a moan as he pressed a slick kiss to my lips, staying long enough that I got a ghost of his heady arousal. There wasn’t an inkling of fear and that only heightened my desire for him. But my skin still held fear for me.

Logan ducked his head down, lavishing both breasts with attention, and more waves of pleasure soared through me. I sagged against the wall since my knees were failing miserably at holding me up and I tangled a hand in his hair, holding him to me, mesmerized by the sight of him. The coldness of the wall was scarcely noticeable.

“Yeh beautiful, Marie,” he repeated against my skin.

I moaned.

He then planted kisses across my collarbone, up the side of my neck and along my jaw, all the while his hands restless over my body. His kiss was blistering, possessive. My hands wanted to rove his body with such intensity I was forced to trap them behind me to protect him. I wanted to touch him but I lacked the control to know when to pull away.

My gaze fell to the mirror by his wardrobe and was thrilled to see he was reflected in it. I was spellbound by the reflection, hypnotized at the rippling of his back muscles as he moved against me, with me. I gasped again when his hand slid round and gripped my wrist. Pulling it from behind me and taking out the other, he continued to hold onto them.

“ _Logan_!” I barely had a chance to voice my concerns before he pressed the whole of him to me.

Every. Last. Inch.

My mind went blank at the sensation of his burning skin against mine, every rise and dip imprinted to memory, the hammering of his heart mimicking mine, every nerve ending lit alight. I could feel his hardness pressing insistently into my stomach through his jeans and the desire that surged in me was dizzying.

“Distracting yeh works, too,” I heard him whisper, his teeth scraping the skin under my ear as he slid his arms round my waist.

He spun me round and guided me backwards towards his bed, his hands roving my skin and his mouth planting kisses wherever he could reach before he set me down on the edge of his bed. Kneeling between my legs, he palmed a breast, grazing his lips across mine. I moaned, running a hand through his hair as he growled and dropped his head to my neck, his teeth scraping my skin.

“Yeh sure ‘bout this?” I heard him mumble.

“Of course ah am,” I answered, shivering as his warm breath tickled my skin. “It’s you.”

He pushed me back, moving me up the bed, and he was above me, his hands anywhere and everywhere and his mouth devouring mine. My hands found his belt buckle, fumbled with it for a moment then managed to open it to reach the button and zip of his jeans. Shoving them roughly down his hips, I gasped as I felt him brush my stomach. His forehead fell to mine, his hands working to get his jeans off. I placed a hand in his chest as he slid his jeans off and pushed him back so I was straddling his lap, his hardness continuing to press into my stomach.

I stopped him as he lifted his head up for a kiss, holding a finger to his lips, and took a moment to properly take him in; the lack of his perpetual crease between his brows, eyes engulfed by his bottomless pupils, the strong line of his nose, the ruggedness of his stubble, the wild curl of his thick hair. He was striking in every way.

And it was all mine.

Running a hand over his biceps, over his shoulders and down his chest, I brushed his nipple, eliciting a low growl. I dragged my nails over his toned stomach, making it tense, and traced one of the grooves bracketing his lower abdomen, causing his hips to buck upwards. Then I grazed my hand over his length, shocked at my boldness and liking the way his hands gripped my waist.

“ _Fuck_.” Logan’s jaw was tense and his eyes fluttered closed.

His skin was so _hot_ there, surprisingly smooth and as hard as steel yet soft at the same time. My stomach tightened as I moved my hand down and his head lolled back with a groan. A hand moved from my hip and tangled itself in my hair.

“Is this okay?” I asked, sliding back up.

“Yeh don’t have”-

I cut him off before he could stop me. “Ah want to.”

His hips pressed slightly into my hand and I took the cue to speed up.

“Ah want to do this cos ah think ya the best person ah’ve ever met,” I whispered, scraping my free hand up his side hard enough it wouldn’t tickle.

He growled, tipping his head forwards. “ _M’rie_.” His eyes were still shut.

“Ah want to do this cos ya not scared of my skin.” I picked up the pace, watching his jaw clench.

His hips bucked up.

“Ah want to do this cos ah like it when ya kiss meh and tell meh ah’m yours and cos ah missed ya.”

He groaned, the hand in my hair tangling itself up even more.

“Ah want to do this cos ah like it when ya touch meh.”

As his hips started to move harder against my hand, I quickened my movements, feeling the arousal coil thick in the pit of my stomach.

“Ah love it when ya get rough and ya bite meh.”

He growled again, the tendons in his neck straining.

“Ah love your claws.”

His hand left my hair, dropped to my hip and I heard the tell-tale _skint_ of his claws. I would’ve laughed but I was far too aroused for that. Instead, I took one of his hands in my free one, marveling at the three glinting blades that could create such chaos yet were mesmerizing for me.

His eyes flickered open and I was shocked to see how dark they were, his hazel irises completely swallowed by his pupils. Drawing his hand to my mouth, I kept our eyes locked as I dragged a tongue along the base of his knuckles.

“I love you.”

His eyes rolled back with a loud groan and he pulsed in my hand, hips canting up restlessly. Pulling me to his chest, I felt something hot and wet splatter over my stomach but I barely noticed. I was too distracted by his expression; head thrown back, eyes squeezed shut and lips parted – thoroughly broken and undone in every way.

It was several moments until he finally relaxed, the tension draining from him. His eyes, however, were just as dark as they had been when he closed them as they opened and scanned me, looking for something. I let go of him and he raised a hand, claws still out. My stomach trembled in delicious anticipation as he trailed the blunt edges of them over the mark he’d made on me. I rocked my hips forward in an attempt to relieve the ache between my legs.

The next second found me underneath him and his fingers were delving downwards with a growl, claws retracting as he shucked me out of my jeans, pants and socks. If I’d thought the first time he’d touched me was intense, it was nothing compared to now. I was too far gone to really notice the first time, too caught up with the inundations of pleasure, whereas now, it was like a blow to my frazzled nerves and eradicating any fears of being naked.

“Thought yeh’d like that,” he chuckled into my ear, swirling his finger round slowly.

I moaned, wanting something _more_. “Ah want _you_ ,” I breathed, trying to keep my eyes focused on him.

“Need ter make sure yeh ready first.” His finger slid lower, closer to where I craved it most. “Don’t wanna hurt yeh.”

Logan’s concern was endearing. A tough, brooding, grumpy guy to many, he is the greatest guy I’ve ever known; loyal, caring, protective and fearless. 

The word ‘hurt’ bounced around inside my head as I realised this might actually be a little painful at first. And that could mean my skin switching on.

“Maybe we should use a condom”- I began with difficulty, mind hazed in desire.

“I’ll heal, Marie,” he said, pressing a single finger into me. “And it’s not yeh time.”

I gasped, eyes squeezing shut. Last time I’d been more fixed on the fact that his finger had been something to grip. Now, it was an extremely arousing _fullness_ that had my hips rising off the bed in search for more.

However, there was still a semblance of sensibility that had me saying, “But ah’ll hurt”-

Logan’s mouth cut off my words and he slowly pulled his finger from me, a thumb pressing to my favorite place. “Just trust me,” he whispered into my ear.

So I did.

As he slid his finger back in, another one joined the first, and a flicker of pain sliced through the fog of lust. I squeaked, biting my lip to mute the sound but he still heard it.

“Sorry,” he whispered, brushing his lips over mine.

I barely heard his words since I was rather distracted by his two fingers sliding back out of me. If this was what his fingers did to me, I was going to be a very gooey puddle once I got the whole of him. It wasn’t helped when he brushed something inside me that rapidly knocked my first favorite place down to second.

“ _Oh_!”

He passed it again, a low rumble reverberating through his chest. “Thought yeh might like _that_ , too.” The smirk in his voice was clear to hear.

“ _Now_ ,” I breathed, hands making sure I knew the line of each corded, rippling muscle and my tongue was exploding with the taste of him. “Ah want ya _now_!”

Opening my eyes, I was shocked to see how dark Logan’s were, studying me intently. It was enough to stoke the flame in my belly with a ferocity that surprised me. His nostrils flared and his fingers slid out, leaving me empty. 

“Yeh definitely sure ‘bout this?” he asked, shifting me so we were under the covers.

“More than anythin’,” I answered, flicking a finger across his nipple, his skin sizzling to the touch. 

He growled, dropping his full naked body to mine, I could finally feel what he’d been holding from me. He settled hot, hard, heavy and _there_ and the solidness of his hips between my legs had me doing a slow undulation just to make sure it was all real.

“Jesus fuckin’ _Christ_ ,” he ground out. Gold flashed in his eyes.

“ _Please_ ,” I whispered.

Bracing his arms either side of my head, he positioned himself, his face swimming above mine and I moaned as I felt him brush the most sensitive part of my body. My heart started to race wildly.

It was happening. I’d fantasized in the darkest hours of the night about this, never really believing they could come true, and now it was all coming true.

“Ready?” His voice was thick and husky.

I nodded, running my hands down his rippling back.

He pressed forward with his tip, just his tip, and it was difficult to tell which was stronger, the stretching discomfort or the giddy pleasure. The pounding of his heart was visible by his pulse fluttering at his neck and he was breathing hard.

“Yeh okay?” he asked through gritted teeth, his eyes swirling gold.

I nodded, not sure my voice would remain level, and pulled his head down to kiss him.

He pressed his lips to mine as he slid farther in, the discomfort worsening. I bit back a yelp, wishing it was not quite so painfully diverting from the pleasure. It was a battle to keep my skin off. Then, without warning, he slid all the way in, right to the hilt, and something tore sharply, pain ripping through me.

My skin automatically came on to fend off whatever was hurting me as his mouth immediately turned soothing on mine. There was no fear, just lust, possessiveness, desire and love which pulled me away from the pain and the stretching and took me to a place where I could marvel at the wonderful feeling of being so _full_ and switch off my skin once more. He was incredibly tense under my hands as he waited patiently for me to adjust to what I was experiencing, lavishing me with kisses while his arms remained steadfast either side of my head.   

“Yeh okay, darlin’?” His eyes were so dark they reflected the moonlight.

I nodded, a little tightly.

It was an odd but very arousing, albeit slightly painful, sensation as he slid his hips back and when he pressed forward, the pain was a fraction of the first time. I suspect my gleaned healing might be the reason why.  

“ _Oh_!” I gasped, flexing my hands against the muscles of his back. 

Logan groaned, throwing his head back, and my hand darted up to trace the protruding tendons. It was rather satisfying to know I was the one causing his pleasure though the thought was rapidly pushed aside as he slid back in, fleetingly touching that place inside me.

“Ya can go faster…”

There was no hesitation, his hips immediately picking up speed and finding a set rhythm that started to echo deep in my bones, this tattoo having been played throughout the course of time. Now, it was my turn to perform my part, my own piece. In and out, in and out he slid, all the while devouring me with his mouth while I tangled my fingers in his hair.

He adjusted his position and changed the angle and I was thrown into another reality, pleasure radiating outwards from where we were joined. He was murmuring my name over and over as he kissed me, capturing any noises I made.

A hand moved from the side of my head, passed over my breasts, down my side and pulled my thigh up, spreading my wide and I mewled, arching up into him as he surged deeper and harder into me. I raked my nails down his back, dragging growls out between his mantra of my name. His eyes were shifting from hazel to gold.

I was climbing, Logan sliding and swirling, his mouth sucking my breasts and nipping my shoulder before showering my face with kisses while I continued to roam him.

“C’mon, M’rie,” he breathed beneath my ear. “Come for me.”

I was getting close, close to the top of the mountain I wanted to throw myself off, and I was meeting each of his thrusts with my own, searching for more. Everything was coalescing to this point and-

“I love yeh, Marie.”

“ _Lo-gan_!”

I threw myself off. I wasn’t just falling. I was flying, delirious, drowning in the feel, the smell and the taste of him all around me. My hands pulled him close and I ground into him, riding out wave after wave of pleasure steamrollering through me.

Logan growled, his claws _sknit_ -ing beside my head, and he threw his head back, thrusting deep into me.

“Mine,” he snarled, continuing the thrust erratically. “ _Mine_.”

“Yours,” I agreed breathlessly, head still spinning from my rush. “Only yours.”

He dropped his head to my shoulder, his teeth sinking into the juncture of my neck and shoulder and I felt him pulse inside me, filling me with his wet heat as he continued to thrust erratically.

“Oh, _fuck_ …” He drove into me one more time then his arms seemed to shudder, his weight dropping onto me.

Using what seemed like the last of his strength, he pulled out and rolled us so I was lounging on his chest. A slow, honey-like warmth started spreading through me.

“Yeh okay?” he mumbled, nuzzling into my hair and wrapping his arms round me.

I nodded, brushing my lips to his chest to show my gratitude since my brain was still recovering. Though, it seemed I would be asleep before it did, drowsiness making my eyes heavy. Logan’s warm arms and chest were not much help, lulling me along.

“Love yeh,” he rumbled fuzzily.

“Love ya,” I whispered back as I slid into sleep.


	25. Chapter 25

The rich scent of sandalwood, cinnamon and cigar smoke from Logan and jasmine from me mixing with musky smell of sex filled my nose as slowly I woke. Two heartbeats, air rushing into lungs, feet pattering on floors, laughter from several rooms away and water running somewhere downstairs had my eardrums aching and the taste of Logan’s mouth was still strong in mine.

My heart did a little flutter at that, the memory of Logan being hot, hard and heavy above me sending warm thrills through me. As I continued to rise from my deep sleep, the smells, sounds and tastes faded enough for me to notice someone tracing light trails down my back and I shivered.

Cracking open an eye, I came face-to-face with a wide expanse of muscled chest. I was lying on my front, arms folded under my head and sheet down at my waist while Logan was on his side, perched on an elbow, his other hand leisurely made its way down my back. In the pinkish morning light bleeding through the curtains, he looked thoroughly debauched, his hair tousled from my hands, his eyes hooded and a pirate smile twitched his lips.

“Mornin’, darlin’,” he murmured, brushing his lips against my shoulder.

I grinned and leant round to capture them. He growled, rolling back and pulling me onto his chest, and I shivered again, his skin scraping over mine. I twisted my hands into his hair and spread my legs to straddle him. Pulling back, I sat up and looked down at him, running my hands appreciatively over his chest. From the corner of my eye, I could see our clothes strewn across the floor and blushed at the thought of what we’d been doing.

Logan pressed a hand to my stomach and moved it upwards, kneading my breast, tracing my collarbone and touching the place where he’d made a mark on my neck, faded due to my healing. But it didn’t stop the sensation of pleasure-pain coursing through me with a gasp. The desire, which I thought was muted, flared up and I saw the same answering in his eyes. Every point we were touching felt like live wires were buzzing between us.

“Yeh so fuckin’ pretty,” he growled, slipping his hand round the back of my neck and tugging me down to plant a searing kiss to my lips.

“I’m going to get a complex if you keep telling me that,” I mumbled against him, hands tangling in his hair.

“Yeh deserve it.” He nipped my bottom lip. “We should head down if we want somethin’ decent fer breakfast ‘fore the rugrats eat everythin’.”

“I was kinda hoping to have a shower.” My cheeks warmed as I said, “It’ll be quicker if we shower at the same time.”

“Darlin’, if we shower together, we’ll run the mansion dry.”

The gentle warming of my cheeks turned to a burn at his unspoken intentions. “Fair point. But it’ll be boring. And lonely.”

He growled, burying his head in my neck. “Go, ‘fore you completely ruin my willpower.” He was half-hard against me.

“What if ah wanted your willpower to be ruined?” I whispered, scratching his head with my nails, a little shocked at the words coming from my mouth.

“ _M’rie_ ,” he groaned, his voice filled with same inflection as last night. “ _Go_.”

I harrumphed playfully. “Okay. I’ll go and shower in my room and I’ll meet you in the kitchen in twenty.”

-:-:- 

 Logan was cooking the last of a batch pancakes by the time I arrived in the kitchen at ten past nine. He was barefoot, dressed in a red flannel shirt which was hanging open, wifebeater tucked into a pair of jeans I recognized as the ones I fumbled off last night. His hair was damp and sticking up in every direction.

Glancing round to make sure no one was in the room, I stepped behind him and reached up to trace the exposed line of his neck with a gloved hand and he arched into the touch before turning, his eyes flitting over the glove.

“Why are yeh wearin’ ‘em?” he asked, pressing a chaste kiss to my forehead.

“I trust you but not anyone else,” I answered quietly, recalling the internal debate in my room after my shower. “And people will ask questions if I suddenly stop wearing them.”

He rumbled deep in his chest, tipping the pancake he was making onto a plate holding at least eight. The one next to it had only three; mine, I guessed.

“Hungry, are we?” I asked teasingly to avert him from my gloves.

“I blame yeh,” he said with a wicked grin, switching off the stove and carrying our plates to the table where he’d already laid out knifes, forks, syrup and glasses of orange juice.

Sitting down, I doused my pancakes in syrup and moved my foot so it was resting on Logan’s without looking up from my breakfast. I saw him smirk, shifting his foot forward, and my foot slid against his ankle under the hem of his jeans. Despite having had sex with this man, the simple gesture had me blushing.

“Why were yeh so tense when yeh woke up?” he asked, swallowing his mouthful.

“Healing factor,” I replied. “It’s really noisy and everything smells until the you in my head turns it all down.” I lifted my foot, curling my toes to scrape his leg. “He’s just as protective as you are and he thinks you’re an idiot.”

Logan snorted and he slid his foot farther forward so mine rose higher. “I think I’m gonna have give yeh some trainin’.” There was a gleam in his eye that had my heart stuttering.

Cheeks flaming, I ducked my head to hide them. “How do you cope with it all? The sounds aren’t so bad after a while but the smells. I could smell _sex_ this morning when I woke. Actual _sex_.” I threw him a glare as he smirked again. “If I’m not concentrating or if I let my head wander too much, I can tell what people are feeling by their smell. It gets so confusing sometimes.”

“Smokin’ help when the smells get too much,” he answered, spearing a hunk of pancake onto his fork. “‘Sides from that, there’s not much ter do but get used ter it.”

I groaned. “At least I heal now,” I remarked. Chewing thoughtfully on a mouthful of syrup-saturated pancake, I then said, “What lessons are you going to have to give me?”

“Teach yeh how to use yeh senses without gettin’ confused.” He grinned. “Should be interestin’.”

At this rate, my cheeks were going to be permanently stained pink. Opening my mouth to retort, I started, nearly spilling my pancakes as Jubilee walked into the kitchen, hair wrapped in a towel and dressed in a yellow dressing gown, the belt tied tightly round her waist.

“Mornin’, Yellow,” grunted Logan.

She shrugged nonchalantly, retrieving a box of Cheerios from the cupboard. “So does that mean the pair of you have stopped avoiding each other? Cos that was _super_ annoying.”

“Yes,” I said, glancing at Logan and trying to signal with my eyes not to say anything about last night since it would around the entire school within hours if she heard.

He seemed to get the message. “Scat.”

Narrowing her eyes, she shifted her weight to one hip. “You’re still talking, aren’t you?”

Logan fixed her with a burning glare.

“That’s exactly the same look Roguey gives me when she thinks I’m being stupid.” She frowned, looking to me. “You weren’t at dinner last night. Wolvie can’t talk for that long, can he, chica?”

I gave her the raised eyebrow look.

“Ouch.” Wincing, she scooped up the box of Cheerios and milk. “Okay, okay, I’m going. I know when I’m not wanted.” She threw me a suspicious look before she vanished into the corridor.

“She’s gonna stick her nose in the wrong place one of these days.” Logan swallowed his last mouthful. “Yeh okay?”

“Fine.”

He waited.

I sighed. “She knows something’s happened.”

“Yeh got a problem with that?” he asked.

“No. I just don’t want the whole school finding out from her.”

He shrugged, standing, and picked up his and my empty plates. “Everyone’ll find out somehow.”

I stood as well, following him to the sink. We were having The Talk. “You’re alright with that?” 

He turned, hands gripping my waist, and he lifted me up onto the counter so he was stood between my legs. I squeaked and clutched his shoulders, feeling my eyes go wide as he gripped my wrists and yanked my gloves off.

“ _Logan_!” I exclaimed. “Anybody could come in!”

He grinned and pulled me against him, pressing the bulge of his jeans to me. “Don’t care,” he rumbled, the words shooting straight through me and igniting a fire.

“There’re kids…” My hands, without me telling them to, tangled themselves in his hair and pulling him closer in contradiction to my warnings. “They could…see…us…” Oh, I _wanted_ him, badly. This was only fuelled even more as I ran my hands down him, feeling his mutton-chops scratch my hands. His hair was on end, his pupils blown and his pirate grin was contagious. “I love you,” I breathed.

His lips were suddenly on mine and I realised it had been a ridiculously long time since I’d tasted him. The warmth of his mouth brought memories of last night flooding in, the same power, hunger and need behind it as he plundered me. I moaned, arching into his hands at my waist and flung my arms round his neck.

“Oh my _fucking_ GOD! I knew it! _I knew it_!”

The screech from the doorway was like an electric shock. My eyes, which had fluttered shut, flew open to catch a fleeting glimpse of an ecstatic Jubilee jumping about in the doorway before Logan held me protectively to his chest.

“I knew it! I knew it! I knew it!”

“Love yeh, too,” Logan whispered into my ear, his breath sending tingles dancing over my skin. “Should I skewer her?”

“Might be a bit messy,” I pointed out, feeling my cheeks burn at being caught.

“She seems a little distracted at the moment.”

Jubilee squealed then disappeared once more, no doubt to tell the entirety of the school what she had seen.

Logan stepped back, his eyes boring into mine. “Yeh ready, darlin’?”

I grinned, brushing his lips with my fingertips and loving the way I could touch him without fear. “With you, always.”

The subsequent kiss was scorching and I didn’t care who saw.

Time had healed. 


End file.
